Majesta
by Mersea
Summary: Would you mind if I loved you? ..No, would you mind if I tried to? I never meant to fall three great guilds. Or to break the heart of a king. I, a mere puppet without strings. Can you still say you'll forgive me, now? /Extended Hiatus/
1. Prelude

_Majesty…_

…_I am an assassin,_

_one who lies and cheats and steals from life itself._

_Why do you look at me with such hate?_

_If you must know…it is my own fate._

_I will leave, when she beckons me to go_

_never to return again._

_Forgive me for this last and final betrayal._

_But, now, at last, I can finally tell you…_

_all of you…_

_my story…_

_Your Majesty._

_

* * *

_

_I'm not the villain they have portrayed_

_That is just a small price I have to pay_

_Remember all these hurtful truths I say_

_And love me anyway_


	2. Opening

* * *

**Chapter 1 – "Opening"**

* * *

-

…

I am not a storyteller. And since my time is short, I cannot formulate a proper storyline for you. I feel, already, that distant pieces of my memory are fading into the void of the forgotten. I can tell you what I remember, but only what I remember.

The rest is not for me to say.

Shall I begin…?

…

-

…

My name I didn't find out till later. At first, I don't think I had a name. Rusalka is what you've known me by. It was given to me by Jukuna, and so that was who I became.

But that comes later.

…

-

…

I've never seemed able to recall my life prior to seven years ago. I now know why. So when I say in the beginning, I really mean from that period of time, the furthest my memory can reach.

I will start from the beginning.

…

* * *

-

I remember the Green Deviruchi. It was my home, my family, my life. We were the grandest circus in Comodo, the land of fantasies, the realm of everlasting festivities. I did not know what escapism meant. I did not know the complications in Rune Midgaard.

But more or less, I was happy, then.

I believe I was sold into the circus life at a young age. There must be some sort of story behind that, though the circus master never leaked a drop of information regarding my true past. That is not of importance, however.

I liked it there. I had nowhere else to go, even if I wanted to leave.

For the latter years of my life spent at the circus, the circus master had discovered that I had an unsuppressed reserve of dexterity, rivaling that of the most skilled of acrobats he already had.

It wasn't long before I realized all the spotlights were trained on me during our part of the show. It didn't bother me. All I knew was that the crowd, larger and louder as it got, could not touch me if I were on stage. The stage was my sanctity.

That June night, after one of our ongoing performances, I spied the circus master beckoning me from the side of the stage. This was no unusual occurrence for me, since he did that on average twice a week for the same reason. The only strange thing about this time, however, was that as I approached him near the curtain, he didn't tell me to change into another set of clothing. I was still in my stage costume.

"Who is it?" I had asked the shorter, mustached circus master who'd been looking out for me for the better part of my years in his caravan. He was a clean man, a good-natured gentleman. He'd never punished me once and I've never hesitated in speaking out or in asking him questions.

"Someone wants to see you," the little man replied. I picked up on his slight discomfort. This was new to me. Normally he would be resigned, or even irritated, when some patron of the show demanded to see me after a performance.

Without further ado, the circus master pushed aside the thick, heavy blue curtains to form a gap to the outside. Not sure how to behave unless instructed, I was a bit anxious, but I followed through without comment.

His presence hit me like a breath of fresh air. Through the evening veil of aquamarine blue, I was staring at the lithe back of a dark-haired man, a rather tall man. His straight, long hair trailed down to the small of his back, drifting gently with the breeze from the sea.

It was apparent to me that the stranger already picked up on our presence, but remained motionless until the circus master cleared his throat and addressed, "Master Jukuna?"

Jukuna. Yes, his name sounded familiar to my ears.

The dark haired man had turned to face us. I let my eyes wander over his features, as I've often done, with everyone. He, however, never glanced at me once during the whole conversation which followed.

"What is your price?"

I fell in love with his voice at once. Not only the sound of it, but also because it was the voice of someone who've seen and heard things beyond my knowledge. The authoritative voice of someone who knew his destiny in life.

"My lord…" The circus master began. I, of course, knew what they were talking about. "She is my star acrobat. Not only that… There are uncountable numbers of patrons who come just to see her on stage each night. I-"

"Is eighty enough?"

It was true that I've been brought aside to many of these conversations before. It was easy for me to discern that I was a valuable asset to the circus master, and no matter how hard they tried to persuade him, he refused to give me up.

This was the first time I've seen him struck speechless.

"I-…I beg your pardon?" the short man said rather breathlessly.

"Eighty million," I heard the one named Jukuna clarify. Judging by the countenance the circus master wore, I could guess it was a large sum of money.

"But you must never mention her again," the dark haired man added.

The circus master cleared his throat and spoke quietly. "How do you propose me to do that?"

By then I was staring at Jukuna with a mixture of excitement and dread. He was the first person who had moved the circus master into thinking about selling me off. What was going to happen to me?

I didn't wish to leave.

"Place someone else in charge and leave quietly. Go somewhere far away. I shall send people to escort you there."

I saw the shorter man consider this carefully. At last, to my surprise, he turned to me and asked, "I will leave this up to you. Will you want to leave with this man?"

Needless to say, I lost my voice. I observed the circus master's face to see if there was any hint of what he wanted me to say. Was there a hidden meaning somewhere? I couldn't tell.

So, I looked to the dark haired stranger and found him looking directly back at me for the first time. For some reason all my thoughts came to a standstill under his gaze.

Then he reached out a hand to me and told me, "Come with me."

I knew then that I had to. I don't know why.

"Yes," I had replied, although I hadn't moved from where I was.

He looked back to the circus master and nodded. "Then it's settled."

I only managed to tear my eyes away when the little man nodded agreeably, and continued nodding as he stirred me away by the elbow. "Allow me a parting word with her, my good lord."

And so, he pulled took me aside, but not far enough to create tension or suspicion. "Ghost," he addressed me, for it was what everyone addressed me as, "do you know who this man is?"

"No."

"He is Jukuna, one of the well-known war heroes of our time, the one who led the Payonese to victory in countless battles during the Wars of the Unrest. You must not offend him in any way."

"What does he want with me?" I had wondered out loud.

"I don't know, Ghost. But I cannot deny him what he wants. If Rune Midgaard did not have him on our side, who knows what would've become of us?"

He gave me a pat on my back. That was meant to be our farewell. I turned to face him squarely.

"Goodbye," I said, and it wasn't to him alone. Behind his short, tidy form loomed the central tent of our circus. We all viewed the tent as the life of a circus. That image was the last I have of him.

"God save thee, child."

He was a good man.

-

"What is your name?" Jukuna had asked me while we were on our way. He slightly ahead and never glanced directly at me once.

"Ghost," was my automatic reply. Indeed it would sound peculiar to any outsider. They did not know how I got that name. It was from the other performers. They all noticed that the only time they could actually see me in clear, full view, was when I was on stage amongst them.

Afterwards I would fade away, completely disappear, as soon as my role is done. It was as the circus master had instructed.

"Then, your name from henceforth shall be Rusalka."

Rusalka.

I grew up in a circus. Of course I knew what the name meant. I heard tales and tales told at nights gathered around a bonfire when no one knew I was listening.

Rusalka. Ghost.

It did not matter to me that they practically meant one and the same thing.

I was happy with a subtler name. If happy was the right word.

"I'm taking you to your new home. However…"

I looked to him curiously.

"That facemask you're wearing," Jukuna told me, "you must never remove in anyone's presence."

I brought my hand up to feel the white satin covering the bottom half of my face up to the top ridge of my nose, white to match with the costume I wore that night.

"I understand."

It was no difficulty for me to do. After all, the circus master had set the same requirement for me.

He nodded his acknowledgement, without looking at me. Some people would stare. Some people would avoid my eyes completely. Still others never knew I was there. I had learned to keep a distance between myself and others. I did not want to alarm anyone.

"You will now be part of us. The Crow. You will meet with the others soon."

That was how it began.

* * *

-

He briefly introduced me to the lower ranked members of his guild, only asking for the three other tribunals to remain. Twelve members they were in total. Five men and three women who tossed me curious gazes as Jukuna ushered them out. The three who remained seated were all male. The elites.

"Rusalka," he said my name. I went up to the edge of the round table and bowed. He introduced them to me by their codenames.

Ice.

Karma.

Art.

Each of them studied me through veiled gazes.

"This is Rusalka," Jukuna repeated as before, and then added, "My younger sister."

That statement at once leveled me to their level. Because Jukuna was their leader. I could tell by the way all three men remained silent until he beckoned for them to speak.

"I entrust her safety to all of you whenever I'm away."

"Welcome." Art stood gracefully and reached across the table to shake my hand.

I didn't take it. I didn't know if I were supposed to.

I looked to Jukuna in the midst of the awkward stilling of time. His grey-green eyes were fixed impassively on Art.

"Word of advice, men," Jukuna said in a soft, threatening voice. "Do not get close."

Art had let his hand drop back to his side, but he remained standing. Three pairs of eyes I felt on my face as if they could discern the mystery if they stared long enough.

I do not think they figured out the warning until after. A while after.

Can you guess why?

It was because Jukuna had bought me for a reason, you see.

Majesta.

* * *

-

…

Majesta.

Back then, I've already heard mentioning of the name, in hushed voices behind the tents.

Majesta, they fancied, was a ghost caravan, never staying in one town longer than to set up a single performance.

Majesta, it was rumored, once eliminated an entire village within three hours; the duration of their show.

Majesta…the macabre circus.

But that comes in later.

…

-

Jukuna installed me in his room. My bed was on the opposite side of the room from his. It was a large room, a circular one with tall window planes all along the edges, plenty of light pouring through if the curtains were drawn aside.

I spent the majority of my time in that room. Jukuna seldom came in before I fell asleep. When I would get up in the morning, he would already be gone. I didn't know why I was there. I was restless enough to talk to him about it, if I ever saw him during the day.

So I passed my time doing my drills. There was more than enough fresh air coming through the windows to keep me active. During the evening I lit the candles and explored the various curious objects in the room. Bows, medals, a small oil painting of a woman with deep blue eyes.

By the candlelight, I browsed through his journals. It didn't seem wrong to me; he would've kept them locked up if he didn't want me to touch them.

They were dated back to his early teens, through the tragic lost of his family, to his roles in the Wars of the Unrest, seven years ago. Seven years ago was as furthest as my memory reached. I've always assumed that I've lost my memory sometime then, during the chaos.

I flipped through the pages carefully until one word, printed neatly dead center of a blank page, and had caught my eye.

Majesta.

"It is not polite to read through other people's journals," a voice said softly, directly behind me. I spun around in my chair.

He went by 'Ice'. The platinum blonde with eyes of liquid blue fire. They called him 'Killing Ice'.

"I am his sister," I replied calmly. Indeed Jukuna had insisted I stuck with that.

He tilted his head slightly, pondering over me. He wore a facemask similar to that of mine, a dark maroon one. It highlighted his fair, fair skin and made his hair look almost white in the candlelight.

"Then, you know all about him. How did his family die?" he questioned me, his eyes having a hypnotic effect combined with the strange soft voice.

"They were killed, by some wizards," I replied automatically. Of course I realized my mistake immediately. Though outwardly I kept my eyes blank, I knew that he knew I realized it.

His eyes told me so.

"You're not supposed to be here," I pointed out simply, pleasantly.

He bowed his acknowledgement, a slow, half-bow. As he backed away, the candles on the half of the room where I sat flickered out into darkness. I never saw where he'd gone, but he had disappeared completely.

I would never feel at ease in that room ever again.

"Jukuna," I said to him that night, having stayed up late to wait for his return.

"Yes?" came his polite reply.

"I would like to leave this room."

"You don't like it here?" he inquired curiously.

"I-I'd like to go outside," I explained. I realized he thought I meant wanting a different room.

"Why, if you desire it, of course," Jukuna told me. "I've never said you couldn't."

"One piece of advice, however," I heard his voice trail over to my bed, "…Keep your distance from the others."

I would've done that without being told anyway.

Back at the circus, everyone respected each other's distance. Of my seven years, I only made one friend, the person who was kept in the cage next to mine. She died, two years past.

At times I still wondered why she died, and I was alive.

But let's not dwell on those details…

As I was saying, back at the Green Deviruchi, no one breached the unspoken agreement regarding personal space.

I didn't expect things to be different.

I did not expect someone who was daring and persistent enough to ignore my need for room.

Someone who was cold and stagnant when it comes to getting something he wanted.

Ice.


	3. Queen

* * *

**Chapter 2 – "Queen"**

* * *

- 

…

The entire guild was very suspicious of me. I could tell. I assumed it was because Jukuna never mentioned to anyone about having a sister before I showed up. It didn't matter to me what they thought my real relationship to him was. Let him deal with it.

The only person, who did impose a threat to me, was of course, Ice.

Let me get to that.

I will soon enough.

…

-

The first person who got me to say anything beyond a word of greeting was Queen. That's what they called her. She was a jubilant young woman who took up position as the cook for all the members, among other things. She seemed to adore Jukuna, and it didn't seem to matter to her what I really meant to him; she paid homage to me ceaselessly nonetheless.

She'd fidget needlessly over how well I was eating. I told her many times that she needn't have fussed over what I wanted, and that I really had no preference whatsoever. I don't think she believed me.

She also questioned out loud in a scolding manner why neither Karma, Ice, nor I ever stayed in the kitchen to eat. She did this on purpose, of course, because Ice had just stepped soundlessly into the room.

"Now, now, Queen. That's because none of us are brave enough to take off our masks in public," Ice declared in a playful tone. I felt myself tense uncomfortably. If it not were for the fact that he didn't even glance in my direction once, I would've gotten up and left at once. I didn't wish to be rude.

"Silly," Queen chided, "You should be able to trust us by now. For heaven's sake, we've known you for five years! What are you afraid of? That we'll point and laugh?"

He chuckled and leaned closer to the Queen.

"No…" he told her. "I'm afraid you'll all fall in love with me."

"Arrogant swine!"

I slipped away during the mock duel involving ladles which ensued.

I did not know he followed me.

As I was crossing the open air path towards the main hall, he intercepted my path.

"It's what you're afraid of, isn't it?" he asked casually, arms folded in front of him. "Of what other people will think of your appearance."

I gazed up at him through my eyelashes. He was bold. No one had ever been so bold to my face before.

Ice didn't seem to care about what I thought of him. "Or is it…" he continued, "that you have something else to hide…?"

He stepped closer. The closest anyone dared to inch towards me. "A secret identity perhaps?" he asked. "A past which haunts you? A spy on our guild?" he listed out the possibilities off the top of his head. "Perhaps you have some sort of hold over Jukuna."

"No," I had replied simply and moved to walk around him.

He blocked me by extending one arm in my way. Strapped on top of his arm were the sharp, flashing blades part of a lethal katar.

"Why did he recruit you…?" Ice asked me in his deadly venomous voice.

"I don't know."

His intense orbs of blue narrowed down at me. "Who are you?"

"Rusalka," I answered.

I don't think he was satisfied by my answer, but I was saved by someone else who happened to walk through at that time.

"Ice, what are you doing?"

It was Art, his soothing voice containing a trace of suspicion.

Ice didn't back down. "Don't _you_ wonder who she is and why she's here?"

Art opened his mouth to speak, and judging by his countenance, it looked like he was going to put Ice in his place.

I cut in before he could.

"I don't know who I was seven years ago, but I was a performer at a circus before Jukuna brought me here."

I did not know why that one admittance rendered them speechless.

Finally, Ice spoke, and when he did, the suspicion was back in his voice.

"…Really? Or perhaps he told you to say that, as well."

Art held up a gloved hand to halt him from saying more, but Ice ignored him.

"Why don't you perform for us?" Ice added slyly. It was a challenge and I knew it.

I was tempted, among other things. It had been weeks since I had the chance to perform before an audience. I wanted to let loose.

But I knew better.

"Why should I?" I asked defiantly. I did not take a liking to his boldness.

"Because it would be…cute?"

He chuckled as I drew back from him. Why couldn't he keep his distance!?

"Ice…" Art hissed warningly, his pastel blue eyes seemed to glow with the glare he shot the other man.

"What's wrong?" Ice eyebrowed the long haired man. "You quit the Church three years ago, nothing's wrong with a little entertainment."

His electric blue eyes turned back to me. "Besides, I want to see if she's good as she acts like."

It didn't occur to me that there could be something wrong with the way I behave. So I had no retorts to make to those smirking eyes of his.

Tension. I realized then that there had existed tension between the two men even before that incident. I didn't want to draw more attention to this than it already had.

"Music," I requested, meeting his eyes defiantly. No one ever belittled me before. Not ever since that first dance the lead dancer back at the circus showed me, which I copied perfectly. True, it was an easy first dance. But that was not the point.

"That can be arranged," Ice replied, amused. He turned, facing the entrance to the guild hall, and called, "Siren!"

'Siren' was the shorter version of his alias. Sirenblood, who came forth to answer the summoning of his superior two minutes or so later, was a slim, pale skinned man with violet-blue eyes and straight dirty blonde hair long enough to rest tilting upwards on his shoulders.

"You called?" Siren inquired with raised eyebrows.

"How familiar are you with circus theme songs?"

"Sir, you mock me," Siren attempted to sound offended. "I grew up with the gypsies. There's nothing I'm _not_ familiar with."

"Play us one," Ice commanded.

Siren tossed a curious look to all of us, but he left, presumably to get an instrument, without comment.

"Perhaps what he knows will not suit your performance," Ice told me, unconcerned.

"I can improvise," I told him curtly.

Siren returned with a pair of long oval shaped drums. Again, he looked questioning to all of us.

"You're going to assist Rusalka in her performance," Ice explained.

"Oh?" Siren looked to me. "What are your instructions?"

"Something fast," I decided. "Hold it." I held up my hands in front of me. "Give me space."

At last, Ice backed away, along with the other two who repositioned themselves further away.

I gestured towards Ice. "Give me swords."

I watched his eyebrows knit. "Swords?"

"Any kind," I added exasperatedly. "Do you want to see me perform or not?"

By the restrained chuckle Art let out, I could guess that no one ever used that tone on Ice before.

I did not know why I spoke that way towards him. It was the first time.

Apparently, Ice was annoyed by Art's reaction. "Art, grab the falchions I left with Queen."

Art hesitated.

"I can deal with it," I heard Ice hiss to him. Art relented and went to do as he was bidden.

_Falchions…_ I thought to myself as I weighed the things in my hand when Art presented me with them. They were heavy things.

I looked up at met the livid blue eyes of Ice and knew he did that on purpose.

"Shall I begin…?" Siren asked me lightly.

"Yes," I told him as I closed my eyes and readied the falchions in my hands.

He began to beat on the drums. He was good. Very good. I stood motionless, listening, until all at once I found my cue and tossed myself into the stream of rhythm and motion he was conjuring up with using only the drums.

I stopped thinking altogether. His sound was so confident and strong that I surrendered myself into being guided completely by his music. It was no longer just a song, but a force that I could feel brushing against me, cradling me, spinning my limbs as it pleased. It was what I've been taught. It made me feel alive.

I lost all sense of time, but eventually Siren slowed me down to a complete halt, bent low in a bowing position. It was a while before I finally opened my eyes and stood. That was when I noticed three more people had joined the audience.

Queen, who had been in the kitchen not far away, had probably got drawn there by the sound of drums. Little Bird, who stood next to the Queen, cradling in one arm a sack of grain, and with the other dangling a large bag of produce. The third, Sweet, who looked like she'd just came back from some harsh traveling, with dirt and rips adorning her dark frock.

"How did I do?" I asked, as a way to break the silence.

"That…was no simple sword dance," Queen remarked.

"Of course not," Siren spoke up. "It was no false play. All the moves were from the Passion Gale style, an elaborate offensive sword-fighting style passed down by indigenous gypsies. It's been a while since I've seen someone perform it so well."

Once, we had guest performers back at the Green Deviruchi. One of those performers was very curious about me, a dark-skinned woman who looked like she might be retiring from the stage soon. It was she who changed my life.

"Ice." Art eyebrowed him teasingly.

Ice narrowed his flashing blue eyes at me. I wondered if I had mortally offended him.

He said not a word. His eyes clearly spoke for themselves. He was not done with me. At that time, however, he chose to bow out. I could only imagine what would happen the next time we meet.

Queen nudged me with her elbow. I was surprised that she touched me, but I hid it well.

"Don't mind him, hun. He's just jealous that someone else besides Art is more attractive than he is," she told me with a wink. When someone used that tone of voice with a wink, it meant he or she was telling a joke.

I took it as such.

"Rusalka," Siren called to me, "You got to show me more sometime!"

I said nothing. I did not know how to respond.

"Pray excuse us," Art interrupted pleasantly, "I would like a word with Rusalka."

Art had in possession a fine, warmth-filled voice pleasing to the senses. His eyes, a livid blue I've never seen before then, nonetheless shone more welcome than the fiery blue that of Ice's. I did not know what it was that drew me to him, but I consented to having a private chat with him as he led me away.

"Do not hold it against him, Rusalka," Art told me conversationally during our stroll in the garden. "Just not long before your coming here, there was found a traitor among our ranks. It will take a while before anyone can get used to you here."

Traitor.

That was a new word to me.

"Who-…?" I wasn't sure how to formulate my question.

"We have enemies, Rusalka," Art informed me gently. "We live in turbulent times."

"What…kind of enemies?" I found myself asking.

An enemy, back at the circus: An over ambitious rival; a person who talked behind your back; a person who you did not like because they were glad of your friend's death.

I had made a lot of enemies.

"Challengers to the throne," Art told me. "Ones who are impatient or ambitious enough to seek to gain control before the true heir can be located."

I looked at him in askance.

"As you know, Tristan the VII, the previous monarch, was assassinated prior to the start of the Wars. His elder son, Majela, met a valiant death on the battlefield. His younger son, having predicted this turmoil to take place years before, Tristan sent into the clergy at an early age, as is customary with second-born. His whereabouts remains a secret which died with Tristan's closest advisors during the Wars of the Unrest. Midgaard is without a rightful ruler."

Art paused to pick off a dead leaf from the stem of a bush. He went on, "Even the elites who bonded together to defend all mankind during the Wars have dissented into numerous rivaling guilds. Some want to defend the order, and to restore the crown prince. Some want a temporary leader to still the chaos right now, or want to take over, themselves. Still others want to rid of the monarchy completely."

He spun the dried brown leaf by the stem with two fingers. He seemed to be preoccupied with something.

"And…" I invaded tentatively, "…Where do we stand?"

"Oh…" He brushed a lock of long, soft brown hair behind his shoulder. "Jukuna is not interested in power or glory. He already has enough influence to gain a majority's support if he tried. He does not believe, however, that it is wise to place a young, inexperienced king on the high throne when we still have all these problems roaming unrestricted."

My eyes must've asked for more, because he glanced at me and continued.

"The radical guilds are foremost the most numerous and problematic." He waved a gloved hand and claimed, "I could make a list off the top of my head."

"Radical?" I asked.

"Powerful guilds," Art told me. "Forceful guilds. The ones that want to take over, and have the resources and manpower to accomplish that, too." He gave me a sheepish smile and raised both hands in a helpless shrug. "Can you imagine what we have to go up against?"

No, how could've I imagined, back then? I've never stepped outside the circus.

"…Who are they?" I found myself asking. I wanted to know if the rumors we heard in our circles matched the reality.

Indeed he made a list. In the midst of the names he rained down, I collected three which I recognized immediately.

Escapade.

Chimera.

Majesta.


	4. Art

* * *

**Chapter 3 – "Art"**

* * *

-

Art showed me around the building that day, something Jukuna already did, but he insisted to do so in more detail. He didn't seem to have any pressing matters to attend to, and I myself had nothing that I had to do.

Somehow, it was the late in the afternoon by the time we crossed guildhall again. Sweet, the green-eyed strawberry blonde, was waiting with her arms crossed next to the door leading to Jukuna's study.

Art saluted her and asked, "Reporting?"

"Leader's in there with Ice," the dark-clothed woman offered as a way of explanation.

I should've left then. But I remained because Art remained. I felt his presence at my back like an invisible barrier which urged me to stay where I was.

We did not have long to wait.

Ice slipped out of Jukuna's study silently, leaving the door ajar. He bowed his head to Sweet, strands of his pale bangs falling into his eyes. Sweet returned the nod and straightened, moving past him to enter the study.

"Art," Ice observed, casually addressing the other man. "Were you waiting to speak with me?" he asked, one eyebrow rose in question.

Art got straight to his point. "What did he say to you?"

Ice said nothing. He had quite the expressive eyes, though.

I heard my name being called unexpectedly. "Rusalka," Sweet told me, coming back through the door. "Jukuna would like to speak with you now."

Before I went in, I saw her shrug apologetically to the two. I suspect she thought she ought to have informed the leader that Ice and Art were left outside with me. Maybe their disputes were well-known by the other members. I could only guess.

I did lock eyes with Ice over her shoulder, however.

I needn't have wondered why he was dubbed 'Ice' by the others.

"I did not call you in to chide you, Rusalka," Jukuna made that clear at once. "However, what took place here today during my absence concerns me." He motioned for me to take a seat across from him. I did so.

"I would've preferred for you to not have gotten near the others, but that can't be helped."

He got up from his high-backed chair, placing his hands on his desk as he studied me carefully.

"Has-…any of them made you uncomfortable in any way?"

I blinked once and – to the best of my knowledge – displayed nothing on my face. The truth was that I was probably as uncomfortable around them as they were of me. For different reasons.

"No," I replied. I did not know how else to handle it.

He seemed to mull over this. I counted the number of swings on the grandfather clock before he finally spoke again.

"I have decided to assign you a trainer, Rusalka."

Jukuna sat back down, contemplating with his lips resting against clasped hands.

"Karma would have been the wisest choice," he admitted, "however I have sent him to collect some information outside of town last week, and he'll not return a week hence. Siren and Sweet, I have a mission to assign them after she gives me her report."

He paused. "That only leaves Ice who can be in charge of the training I have in mind for you."

Ice.

It occurred to me that he was waiting for some sort of response. I didn't know how to.

"Will you be fine with that arrangement?" Jukuna questioned me.

"Yes," I told him.

What else could I have done?

* * *

-

The three were still there when I went back out. I nodded to Sweet, signifying that Jukuna would like to see her. She went in without a word or a backwards glance.

Both men were still, waiting for me to speak. Art was half-sitting, half-leaning against the windowsill. Ice was leaning against a pillar in the interior of the hall, with his arms folded neatly in front of him.

I looked at Ice for a long moment. I was supposed to tell him. I was supposed to tell him Jukuna's decision, but I didn't. I don't know why.

Instead I went to Art, stopping at a suitable distance from where he sat, and asked him to escort me back to my room. Jukuna's and mine.

He did so, cheerfully. I've never met anyone who could seem so comfortable around me. Along the way he asked me all sorts of questions; how my hair was so perfect, what was life like in a circus, if I had any relations, if I've been affected by the Wars. To all of which I smiled with my eyes and said nothing. It didn't seem to bother him, however. He just kept telling me bits and pieces of himself and throwing me a question, to which I had no answer, here and there.

I found him pleasant to be around.

-

At the door, I bid him goodbye. He saw my hesitation, though I don't think he could guess the reason.

"If you ever need me, you can come find me," Art told me. "You know where my room is."

I needn't have worried so much. Not even Ice would be bold enough to do something which would've caused me to speak up to Jukuna. Which doesn't mean that he didn't have ways to get around that.

Anyway. That evening, when I returned to my room, I picked up Jukuna's journal from his writing table by his bedside. It was the last one, the latest one, the one I had been flipping through when Ice encountered me in that room.

Majesta.

The name drew me to it. Calmly I flipped to the same page that I've first seen the name. Turning the page, I found blank after blank page. I knew the trick.

Lighting a candlestick, I raised the blank page in front of the light. Scrawling words written with the same hand as the rest of the pages came into full view.

They were lists. Names. Dates. Numbers. I did not know what they meant, but I could guess what they were recorded for.

Jukuna was keeping account of Majesta's activities.

I went back and forth between the pages. I did not know what exactly I was looking for. My fingers came to rest on a page which was not a list, but one with a paragraph filling half the space.

This is what I read.

_'Majesta, a 'ghost' circus which suddenly surfaced in Rune Migaard approximately six years after the Wars. More alarming than the fact that it had been never heard or seen prior to that is the observation that Majesta is seemingly headed by a single young prodigy by the name of Sethron, a-…'_ Here my thoughts slowed down considerably. _'…a High Wizard.'_

* * *

-

You might think that meant something to me because I knew that wizards were near-extinct by then. I didn't.

One time back at the Green Deviruchi, my friend asked me how is it that I was able to read. I was surprised. It never occurred to me that there were people who couldn't read. After all, why would there be signs and posted schedules if people couldn't recognize what they said?

She explained to me in the breathy, baritone voice of hers. "No, Ghost. We were not born with the ability to speak or recognize signs. We learn."

I looked at her strangely. I suppose I understood what she said. And at the same time didn't understand what she said.

How is it that I could speak and read, then?

My friend helped me with that.

"I suppose someone taught you before you came here," she told me. "You were already almost grown up when you've been sold into this circus. Perhaps the lad who came with you ought to know something, if only a little. You and him were close."

She was referring to Galasyian, I was sure. I wasn't sure what she meant by closeness. I don't recall much of him; he left the Green Deviruchi in the early days. I thought I would never see him again.

I told her as such.

I don't know if she believed me.

"Well," she mused, "do you have any idea how you lost your memory?"

No.

Was it important to have memories, anyway?

"Uhm…" She scratched her head and thought about it. "You remember things from your past. And I've always heard that it's your past that defines who you are as a person. Also, you remember people who were important to you, and you can tell how important they were by how long you remember them for… The chances are, you were important to them, too."

-

…

Will you remember me?

Will anyone?

If I left, and no one remembered…

…Did I ever exist at all?

…

…I want to remain in your memory, forever…

…

-

"If my memory is gone, does that mean I'll never get it back?" I asked her.

She chewed on her lower lip as she thought. It was a habit of hers.

"I don't know if a healer can cut it. They can't always fix anything of the mind. Maybe magic. If you ever meet a wizard."

"But do not despair, Ghost," she added. "You can always ask a good priest to pray for you. That might work, too."

I nodded in acknowledgement.

* * *

-

The next morning, I waited at the kitchen table for Art to appear. Queen didn't seem to let my presence disturb her, though she did toss me many a curious glances and asked me if something was wrong.

I smiled with my eyes, and shook my head.

When Art did enter the room, toweling off his damp, long hair, his long overcoat disheveled and open at the top, he didn't seem surprised to see me. I stood up when I saw him.

"Were you waiting for me, Rusalka?" he greeted pleasantly.

"Yes," I replied.

He nodded and told me, "I shall return presently."

"How do you do it?" Queen came around and asked me as soon as he was out of sight.

I looked at her questioningly.

"I've known him for two years and I still can't help but to avert my eyes when he looks at me." She winked. "As far as I know, that's better than blushing when he speaks to me, like what the other two does."

Queen gazed at me with what looked like a mix of envy and admiration. "Yet you don't seem affected by his charm at all. Is he not the best looking man you've ever seen? There's a reason why we nicknamed him Divine Art, you know."

I wasn't sure I understood what she meant. I often had strangers, especially female ones, averting my eyes when they see me. Other times they would forget what they were doing and stare in a stupor of something like a cross between shock and disgust. Did that mean I am good looking?

During that time I was kept in a cage, I had many a parent snatch their child's arm away when they attempted to touch me. During that time, too, I've observed many people, people who came and went in front of my cage. The only difference I could make out was that some people's faces took longer for my eyes to get adjusted to. That was all it came down to; getting used to someone's appearance, and to be able to remember how they looked like, wasn't it?

My friend, who had occupied the cage next to mine; people behaved the same towards her. Did that mean she was good looking, too?

I was tempted to ask Queen that.

I didn't get a chance to piece together a sensible question. Art came back into the room.

He had his hair combed, the soft loose strands at front reaching down to his elbows. The sunlight through the open doorway lit the thin, pastel strands into a shade of brilliant orange-gold. He had changed into tidy clothes, a delicately embroidered white blouse. His black pants made his legs look long and slender underneath.

"Am I interrupting?" he asked good naturedly, glancing from me to Queen, who snapped out of her trance and shook her head with a grin.

"Oh, no. She's all yours," Queen told him.

Art laughed simply, care freely. His light blue eyes turned to me and he smiled easily.

"You have something to say to me. Come."

I followed him down the path through the garden, again. I enjoyed the morning scenery. He didn't seem to be in a hurry to know what I needed, either.

Alas, I kept quiet and matched his pace until he stopped and turned to me.

"What is it?" he questioned softly, "Has Ice done anything which has made you uncomfortable?"

I shook my head.

"Art…" I gazed up into his eyes. "I want to remember my past. Can I beseech you to say me a prayer?"

He lowered his eyes, his dark, long eyelashes shielding them from sight.

"Rusalka…"

Art was silent. A heavy pause.

"I do not know if He will answer me. I left His company three years past. I have neither entered a church nor prayed since then."

I was curious. He was referring to the thing called 'religion', I was sure. I remember having heard a religion was finding a purpose to existence, or something. I did not understand.

"Who is 'He'?" I asked.

Art smiled tenderly and looked up towards the sky. "He is God," he replied simply.

Imagine my confusion.

"Then…God is your religion?" I puzzled out loud with a small frown.

When I looked back down from the blank blue sky, I saw him staring down the path with a faraway look.

"I don't know…anymore," Art answered. "A lot has changed after the Wars. I left the Church as a result of all those complications."

I felt hollowness at his words. I don't know why.

"A friend once told me…finding the key to my past is the first step to finding out who I am, something all human beings have to struggle with. I've heard that…a religion is the meaning of why we exist. Then…"

I wasn't sure if I was making any sense to myself.

"I exist…to find my past…to find out who I am…so I can be sure I am human…"

He looked at me in mild surprise. Of course, he wouldn't know how it was back at the circus. I had my reasons to doubt.

"Then…my religion is…to be human?"

I wasn't sure if I had offended him. He bowed his head and I didn't want to be rude, so I looked away.

But when he looked back up he was smiling. It was a small, sad smile, but a genuine one nonetheless. His eyes shone with words which he did not speak out, for the only thing he said out loud was a gentle, "Thank you."

I did not understand what he meant. But there was something there not meant to expressed by words. At that moment, he meant my everything.

-

…

…Art…

I still can't believe-...

...Why did it have to be him...?

…

-

Art closed his eyes and tilted his face upwards, letting the sun shine down on him. Finally, he spoke. "If I can, I will do as you requested, Rusalka. If you will wait a little while for me."

He looked down at me for my response. I bowed my head in gratitude.

It was the sound of approaching footsteps which caused us both turn to the newcomer.

Sweet, in her new set of dark traveling garb, bowed respectfully to Art before placing her hands on her hips skeptically. "You're planning to leave in _that_?" she asked incredulously. "Come on, it's almost time to go."

He nodded his acknowledgement and beckoned for her to leave us alone for a moment longer.

"Will you wait for me, Rusalka?" Art asked me gently.

I hesitated in my response. I wasn't sure what he meant.

"Where are you going?" I had asked, curious.

He gave me a smile, a sheepish, apologetic smile, and replied,

"…Majesta…"


	5. Ice

* * *

**Chapter 4 – "Ice"**

* * *

-

…

Why I just spent all that time talking about Art… There are many reasons. None of them are to be easily discarded. You will see how crucial a link Art was in the grand scheme of things. Greater than you could imagine.

This, of course, also leads into Ice. Let me tell you about Ice, now.

…

* * *

-

I found out from Queen that Art was sent east for a direct confrontation with Majesta. He was to attempt to negotiate something with the leader of the circus. Karma was over there already, keeping track of its whereabouts. Siren and Sweet had been sent simply to escort Art, and provide backup if he needed it.

She hadn't been informed of the details. I knew what she knew, but couldn't say to me;

Art may never return.

"I can't believe you're stressing over Art," the semi-familiar voice of Ice intervened with the heavy mood in the kitchen.

"I'm not," Queen huffed indignantly. "I know he can't be beaten." She pursed her lips and made move to return to her work. Then she spun around abruptly. "But to send him by himself!? Not even Art can deal with that many opponents!"

After a moment, Ice replied calmly, "It was by his own choice. Besides…" The blonde man cocked his head to one side, his eyes smirking devilishly. "You know he's the best of us."

I could not tell if he meant what he said, for with the same breath, he looked to me and told me coolly, "If you're done eating, Jukuna would like me to start working on your training right away. Meet me in practice hall."

"One bit of advice," Queen said to me as I was about to leave after Ice. "Do not complain to him. He can't stand that."

I wondered what constituted as complaining. I wondered if I complained often.

So I settled on not speaking at all.

It wasn't hard to accomplish; Ice had not much to say to me anyway. The only words we exchanged was when I entered the practice hall, his back turned to me as he examined the weapons hung on display by the weaponracks on the wall.

"Have you used daggers before?"

The Passion Gale was strictly a sword style. They never taught me any other weapon.

I shook my head, and then realized he couldn't see that.

"No," I told him.

"Well, you can't take swords with you everywhere you go. Here."

He tossed two blunt-edged daggers on the floor. They slid to me on the marble surface until they came to a stop right before my feet. Right away I knew I couldn't do it. I just couldn't.

But I said nothing.

Tentatively, I picked up the alien things. I was determined to try.

-

Ice took me through the basic moves. Then he showed me through some drills. That part, on its own, was easy enough to follow. I've been trained to imitate and reproduce performances from other members of the Green Deviruchi.

For that's all I did back at the circus.

Imitate.

"Spar me. I'd like to see how you do."

I was surprised he spoke. For some reason I expected him to remain silent and observing for the remainder of the time, never commenting once.

"Is something the matter?" Ice asked me when I went completely motionless.

I was afraid. He'd just asked me to do something outside of an imitation. Something which required my own planning.

I did not know what to do.

"Rusalka…" he pronounced my name darkly, his eyes narrowing ever-so-slightly in warning.

I nodded. I was still determined to give it a try.

So at his signaling, I readied the weapons and did as I was told.

I wasn't sure what happened. Not only was he able to avoid all my attacks effortlessly, he seemed to be able to _read _them. I was sure that I wasn't using the same pattern as in the drills.

I stopped. I felt as if I couldn't hold onto the hilts for much longer. I think Ice noticed my shaking.

"…Don't be afraid," he told me sternly. "I'm not going to harm you."

That wasn't what I was afraid of. At least, I don't think. I just…couldn't do it.

"…Ice…"

I don't often address people by their name. I was simply weary then.

He looked at me with his dark blue eyes. He likely expected what was coming, though not really.

"I can't…" I told him resignedly, "…I need…music..."

Well I suppose it was a strange request. One that couldn't be readily carried out since Siren had gone with Art on his mission.

I held his eyes and wondered what he was thinking.

"I see…" He motioned for me to hand him one dagger. I did so.

"Close your eyes," he commanded.

So I did.

"I want you to block my attacks without opening your eyes. Understood?"

I kept in mind what Queen warned me about. So I nodded without comment.

Ice thrust his dagger at me without further warning. I deflected his blow with the flat of my blade inches away from my face. Not leaving room for me to catch my breath, Ice continued his assaults at a steady pace. I did manage to block most of his attacks. The others, I couldn't keep up with, and side-stepped instead.

After only a few minutes, Ice halted and told me I could open my eyes.

"Jukuna assigned you to the wrong person," Ice told me lazily, putting away the dagger and gesturing for me to hand him mine.

With that, he turned to leave. "Tell Jukuna there is nothing more I can do for you."

I watched him go and couldn't help but feel I've failed him somehow.

"Ice!" I called out. He turned back halfway, arching one eyebrow in askance.

"I'd like to spar you again. Sometime," I told him. He acknowledged this request with a bow.

But if I thought I would be relieved of his presence, I was wrong.

* * *

-

"Can you perhaps guess the reason why I called you here, Ice?" Jukuna questioned softly, dangerously. His sharp grey eyes which were almost green glittered with held back emotion. I took it that no one in the guild defied him often.

"I know that you, out of all people, are most suspicious of her. That doesn't give you the power to defy my will, however," Jukuna told him calmly, fingers drumming on the surface of the armrest of his chair.

Ice lowered his eyes respectfully and spoke. "With respect, Jukuna, that is not my meaning. Whatever method of training she'd been through, the outcome is that her mind is fine-tuned to rely on her sense of hearing to coordinate her moves. However her reflex, dexterity, and accuracy are excellent. It would make more sense for her to be a range user." He glanced at me out of a corner of his eyes. "I presume she'll also be more comfortable as one."

"Indeed that may be true," Jukuna drawled lazily. "But I asked you to train her in the use of daggers, regardless of what her strengths may be. Do you perhaps question my motives as well?"

The two men locked eyes.

"She is literate, Jukuna," Ice told him quietly, in a tone one would use when announcing that a loved one was dead.

"That doesn't necessarily constitute as a trait for a spy," Jukuna replied calmly.

"No," Ice had agreed, "but it does seem odd, doesn't it? For someone who'd grown up in a circus to be able to know how to read."

Like I said, all I know was that I knew how to recognize words in written from ever since I could remember, which was seven years past. I do not know how I learned. I do not remember past then.

Jukuna, who knew this detail about my murky past, having spoken to the circus master about it, said nothing to Ice. He knew if Ice found out that my past is unknown, it would only serve to alienate him from me further. I believe that was the reason why he chose not to respond.

After a moment's silence, Jukuna said softly and firmly in his most authoritative tone, "I believe you are well-versed in throwing knives as well. Perhaps you could work out a compromise."

His eyes brooked no argument.

So Ice didn't make any.

But if I had thought that would be the end of it-…no, I didn't think it would be the end of it.

"Ice…" I said when we were both leaving Jukuna's study. "Someday…I'll tell you."

For the first time, I could not read his eyes.

* * *

-

"Ice was just here. He told me to tell you to meet him in practice hall again after you're done," Queen informed me the next morning when I entered the kitchen.

"Tell me about the spy," I said to her.

She was surprised I brought that up so suddenly, but the recovery was swift.

"Did Jukuna tell you to ask me? Despite what he believes, I may not be the better person to tell you this," Queen admitted. "As long as you keep that in mind, I guess I can tell you what I know."

No, I did not ask Jukuna, therefore it wasn't him who referred her to me. I didn't seem to need to explain that to her, however, for she began anyway.

"Her name was Khadori. At least, that's what we knew her by. Green hair, blue eyes. A talented young healer. Extremely pretty, if you ask me. Took an immediate and lasting fascination to our Art; he is well-known to those who've heard of him." She paused and pondered on this. "It's not safe for me to say, but I suspect that was part of the reason why the two men don't get along well, now. Ice was interested in the girl, I believe."

"Ice…?" I questioned.

Queen laughed, her pink-red eyes sparkling. It was their natural color, I found out later. Art was the first person who came from the Church and didn't make her life miserable about it.

"I know how you feel, Rusalka, but Ice is actually a good guy. He's not someone who'll ever turn away if you need help."

Queen returned to the task of peeling potato skins with a small knife, the sharp gestures she made were precise and continuous. "Khadori returned some of his interest, in the end. That was the worst thing she could've done to him." The red-eyed albino sighed and brushed away a stray strand of purple hair from her eyes with her forearm. Purple dye was expensive; I wondered how she got hold of some.

"You see…" Queen went on, "…she was such a sweet, generous girl. A delicate flower; graceful and soft-spoken. Ice brought her in because the girl needed protection. And besides Art and Maven, who were always sent on missions, Khadori was the only one who was knowledgeable enough to help Jukuna with his papers."

So Jukuna trusted her that much. This Khadori must have been a good actress.

"She knew our plans, read our connections, and one day took some important documents and left. It must've been set up because no one knows where she disappeared to."

But I could see that she had her guesses.

-

I made my way towards the practice hall after I left Queen's company. As I approached the double doors, however, a strange sensation propelled me.

I did not know what possessed me. I did not enter.

I left in search of Jukuna.

He was at the archery range, sporting friendly competition with another female archer in the guild, Lai. She would turn and glare at him every now and then when his aim proved better than hers.

Perhaps it would be interrupting.

"I'll be with you in a minute, Rusalka," Jukuna called out without having to look in my direction. He had sensed my presence.

"What is it?" the black haired guild master asked me conversationally as he removed the shooting tab from his hand. "Is Ice making himself a problem?"

Although it was still hard to tell, I wondered if they were all suspicious of Ice. He was the one who recruited the girl, Khadori, wasn't he? Why else would both Art and Jukuna be so concerned over how Ice was treating me? Was it that they thought perhaps he could intimidate me into siding with him?

"How do you know if I'm not a spy as well?" I asked him bluntly after we've left Lai practicing alone.

He chuckled. His grey-green eyes gazed down at me thoughtfully.

"Did you think I didn't know who Khadori was, before I agreed to recruit her?"

I said nothing. I hadn't thought of it in that light.

"I was the one who sent him there that day, to kidnap her under the disguise of accidentally giving him wrong descriptions. He hasn't forgiven me for this deception, no."

Jukuna must have read something on my face, because he smiled sheepishly and explained, "It wouldn't have worked if I had told Ice the truth. No one else except Karma, who assisted in the researching of her background, knew who she really was. A spy."

I blinked up at him. Then, did that mean he knew where she went?

What he just told me was strange and unfathomable to me.

"I don't understand…" I admitted. "…You knew she was a spy…"

He smiled again. He had a magnetic smile.

"Because it would be impossible to defeat them by using force. Many a mercenary army have tried and failed. Their defense is impeccable."

"They?" I asked him lightly.

"You're a curious girl, Rusalka," he told me. I lowered my eyes apologetically. But that wasn't the end of his sentence. "I'm sure you've figured it out by now."

Of course. My mind and understanding only put forth one single answer.

Majesta.

"You are here for a reason, Rusalka," Jukuna informed me. "I will need your help." He stopped walking and faced me fully.

"I will serve you to the best of my abilities, my lord," I told him. It was what my circus master wished.

He nodded. "You will not, however, mention what I will tell you to anyone. Aside from me, the only other person who knows about the mechanism of this plan is Art."

Art.

So I assume… the plan was already in motion by then.

"I wouldn't have burdened you with this if there were any other way to stop them," Jukuna told me lightly.

I drew in a deep breath. I was not afraid.

"What is it that you would have me do? I will do it."

He smiled again, but this time it was a regretful smile.

"There is really only one thing you need to _not _do, Rusalka. The rest is up to us."

I waited for him to explain. I could not guess what it was.

His eyes were sober as he told me, "…Do not fall in love."


	6. Lai

**

* * *

**

**Chapter 5 – "Lai"**

* * *

- 

…

It was a strange request – no, not a request. An order.

Do not fall in love.

With whom? Do not fall in love with whom?

He had not specified a name. Nor had he specified a time.

I took his command to heart; locked it away in a little corner of my soul that could feel no love.

Not for anyone.

But where was I…?

Oh yes…Ice…

…

* * *

- 

When I once again made my way to the practice hall, I found both Ice and Queen outside the doors.

"There you are!" she cried with her hands on her hips when she spotted me. "My goodness, Ice, you don't have to be so impatient on her! She has been skipping meals because of you!" Queen scolded him.

Ice looked at me questioningly.

"Actually…" I started to explain, but Queen cut me off.

"Because you tell her to meet you straight away, and you know how she doesn't take her meals in the kitchen. Well! Are you planning to make her miss lunch as well?"

Ice frowned at the accusation. Queen waved her hand dismissively.

"Whatever, but I want you to make_ sure_ she does eat her lunch, okay? She hasn't been eating well lately, but she wouldn't tell me what's wrong."

She didn't give me a chance to say anything. As she went by me, I saw her sneak me a wink. And I did not understand.

"You could've said something," Ice told me before turning to enter the practice hall. After a moment of confusion, I followed him.

He went to a drawer placed next to the weapon racks, pulling out the drawer third from the top. "These are called stilettos," he told me, holding one up by the blade between two fingers. It was a long and narrow dagger with a very thin blade. I would have recognized it for what it was before he named it.

"I will teach you how to use these," Ice told me, not bothering to glance in my direction. He reached inside the drawer and lifted a tray of these stilettos out. "…Let's head to the archery range."

-

Lai, the female archer, was still there keeping her skills in shape when we arrived. She was a lively thing, not a teenager but still gave the impression of being younger than the rest of the others, and her eyes widened expressively at the sight of Ice before looking away. Was she intimidated by his presence?

I wondered at that.

Ice drew my attention back to him when he spoke. "Although the knife is a lot harder to control, and the distance it covers cannot be compared with that of a bow, there are advantages with using throwing knives. I'll show you." He laid the tray of stilettos on the grass and picked up three with each hand by the blades, between his fingers. "Watch; this is why, aside from being able to carry knives to places where bows aren't allowed, the knives are considered more deadly."

He held both hands in front of him and positioned himself in front of a target. Then he drew his arm back slightly and flung the stilettos in his right hand first, the ones in his left hand following momentarily. The blades clashed midway to their selected target, diverging sharply in their lines of flight and gaining more momentum from the hit.

Aside from one stiletto which struck off center, all five of the other knives shot the bull's eye on five separate targets lined in a row across from where we stood. It had happened so fast that I could've missed it if I had looked away for an instant.

Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Lai clench her jaw wistfully and unstrung her arrow from her bow, disrupted from her practicing.

"For example," Ice spoke, unaffected by our reactions, "with sufficient amount of strength and precision, you should be able to take down more attackers at once, within range, of course. Even the best of archers can take no less than two seconds per shot, and in most cases, take down one enemy at a time."

I saw, again with my peripheral vision, Lai giving him an unappreciative glare. He did not seem to notice, or rather, he ignored it. "Are you prepared to give it a try?" he asked me.

"Yes…" I replied.

Ice handed me a stiletto, by the hilt. I took it, tentatively in my hand.

"Get a feel of the weight of the weapon first," Ice told me before turning to Lai, who had lowered her bow and was watching. "You might want to step back," he warned her.

I weighed the blade in my hand, the feel of it bringing back early memories. My earliest memories. I wondered if I still remembered how. While Ice still hadn't turned his attention back to me, I thought I'd test my memory. Clasping my hand around the cool, unstained steel, I drew my hand back to the side of my face, up to my eye level. Glancing sideways at the targets at the other end, I located my mark and let the knife fly.

There was a metallic screech, and my knife flopped lifelessly to the grass.

Ice turned and raised an eyebrow down at me. "There's no need to be hasty. I haven't shown you how to handle it yet."

From behind him, for that was where Lai displaced herself at, the archer scoffed and said, "I don't know what else you can show her. Her knife went straight to the bull's eye and hit the butt of your knife and rebounded. Your back was turned, but I saw it."

His vivid blue eyes turned back to me. He said nothing.

"I was taught that…by a…friend…" I trailed off. I had a feeling that he didn't believe me.

-

"Bah, what a grump," Lai muttered after Ice was gone. "By the way, my name is Lai, if you've forgotten. I've only met you that one time when Jukuna introduced you to us."

She smiled brightly and held out a hand to me. I wondered about that.

"Er…you don't like handshakes?" Lai dropped her hand and shrugged sheepishly.

Handshakes?

"So…" Lai scratched the back of her head uncertainly.

"My name is Rusalka…" I told her, unsure of what to do.

She gave me a sly smile. "Of course. Everyone's been talking about you, and if you're indeed Jukuna's sister…or something else." Lai shrugged helplessly and asked, "What do you think of Queen?"

What do I think of Queen?

What _did_ I think of her?

"She's…" I didn't know what to respond with. "…Supportive."

Lai gave me a veiled look. I could almost identify it as one of sympathy.

"Well," she told me resignedly, looking off into the distance, "don't get too close to her. You'll see why."

I stared at her in wonderment. Not simply because of what she said, but because of how her demeanor reminded me that much of my friend. They looked nothing alike.

"Oh, look," Lai told me while gazing over my shoulder with a frown, "he's back."

I turned to look, and sure enough, it was Ice who was walking back towards us.

"Excuse me while I wander off," Lai told me. "He _looks_ cool and all that, but seriously. He freaks me out. I'll catch you later sometime, okay?" She gave me a little wave and was off before I could say goodbye.

"Rusalka, come with me," Ice commanded.

I followed.

"Queen wanted me to bring you some food. I presumed you'd like to be somewhere secluded." He drew up the blinds, letting light pour into the room by the weatherworn, old fashioned windows facing the back of the guildhall building. "No one ever comes by," he explained. "They know I come here to not be disturbed."

"…They are afraid of you…" I remember saying, half-questioning, and half-stating. I was looking around the room. It had a high ceiling, unpainted and unadorned walls, and a casual air circulation which allowed the summer head to slip inside the place. It felt like the place could've once been intended for an indoor garden, or a storage space.

"As they should be," Ice agreed easily. "My reputation did not simply drop on me from the sky, you know."

My eyes could pick up bits of everything sewn in piles on the floors, under and above old wooden furniture too worn to be displayed in guildhall, and in too good condition to be thrown out. There were clothes – men clothes, clothes not meant to be worn every day and certainly not in the style he was wearing at the moment. Neglected weaponry…wooden crates…leather-bound books…

…Books?

"I'll be outside," he told me, offering for me to hold a full plate of sandwiches Queen had prepared. No doubt she had made too many for me alone.

"Don't leave," I said when he reached the door. I wasn't afraid of him. "I don't believe you have to go through all this trouble just to grant her request." I gazed at him through my eyelashes. "What do you want?" I asked.

He turned, slowly, his eyes glinted blue as a ray of light struck his shadowy form from the windows. He crossed his arms and leaned back against the door, as if he found something amusing.

"What do you know of the Green Deviruchi?" Ice drawled. I stared at him in disbelief. "The circus which recently disbanded after the disappearance of its master, infamous for the level of risks their performers took to give their audience the thrill they so desired," he elaborated. I knew then what he was doing. He was telling me indirectly that he knew. He somehow found out.

"Rumor has it that the circus is haunted," he went on. I continued to stare at him blankly. "A phantom killer, who was never seen, never caught. It's been speculated that the killer was among the circus' own ranks, as it was the other members who were slain, not the visitors."

"That is just a rumor," I replied. Yes, such a rumor had once reached my ears, but there had been no proof for it being a reality. As a result, it had been widely shrugged off as a rumor being spread by rivaling circuses.

That was when I realized what I should have realized the first time he'd deliberately lured me into giving away what I wasn't supposed to say. He posed a very serious threat to me. Lorce had always told me I reacted to a situation before I stopped to think about it, that I acted on this thing called 'impulse'.

My impulse then was to leave. But he was blocking the door.

"What do you mean by this, Ice?" I had asked, not knowing where he was going with this.

"You're saying that everything you know, you've been taught for the stage," Ice said slowly, looking at me to make sure I understood each word. "Then, give me the name you went by while you were with the Green Deviruchi. I'll find out if you are lying."

He waited expectantly. I looked back at him, motionless. He might have taken my hesitance as signs of guilt. But that wasn't the reason.

All I knew was that, if I told him the truth and he researched into it, he'll still end up suspicious – if not even more suspicious – of me than he already was.

My mentors…and Lorce, the close friend I mentioned before, were all already dead. No one will remember me.

"Well?" Ice arched a brow. My eyes had lowered to the floor on their own accord. I then raised them back up to look at him. Because he was waiting. Because I saw in his eyes that, either I told him or I didn't, it would make no difference in the way he regarded me. So I told him anyway.

"Ghost," I told him, watching for any reaction on his face, "I was 'Ghost'."

* * *

- 

"What happened between you and Ice?"

You know, that would seem like a favorite question people asked me for what was to come. At that time, however, it was Jukuna who spoke to me. Ice had paid him a little visit in his office earlier, when the guild master had returned from outside business. I heard it from Queen.

"He didn't threaten you in any way, did he?" Jukuna had wanted to know.

By that time I've gotten the idea of how dangerous Ice was seen. After all, all his guild members were continuously warning me of him.

"He wanted to know my name before you brought me here," I told him quietly.

The black haired guildmaster sighed and stopped pacing, seating himself back down in his chair. "He is going to be a problem, isn't he?"

I believe that was a rhetorical question.

Jukuna laid his chin on his hands, a look of contemplation stealing over his features. "This will not be easy."

He opened his eyes, his grey-green orbs fixing on me intently.

"You will have to go out of reach," he told me, and I knew he meant it as an order. "You will have to become elite."

-

…

An elite. Do you know what that meant?

It meant being one of the best. It meant being a match for the likes of Ice, and Art, and Jukuna, himself.

If it hadn't been an order, I wouldn't believe it were possible.

But it had been an order. And so I could say nothing.

…

-

I had returned his gaze, wordlessly. He was being serious. And I did not understand.

"In only two week's time," Jukuna told me, "you must prove yourself worthy to join up with the ranks of the elite. Only then can I assign you a partner of equal skill." He asked me, "Can you do it?"

I?

"I will do as you command, my lord."

He nodded, glancing at the papers laid out on his desk. "This was not what I originally had in mind, or else I would have pushed it back." He paused.

"Two weeks from now the other three sectors of our guild will gather here with us. Members will be relocated based on their performance of skills. This one here keeps the ones with most potential, even though I do have more say in that. To be one of the elites of this sector, though…" Jukuna looked pointedly to me. "There can be no mistakes, Rusalka. I do not have the final say in that."

All this because of Ice. Because Jukuna would prefer that Ice not know about his plans. If I had been wiser, I would've known by then that things are not always what they seem on the surface. I should've suspected that there were reasons why he was taking so many precautions, even in the face of his closest colleagues.

How could I have known?

"This speeds things up a bit…" I heard Jukuna murmur to himself.


	7. Karma

* * *

**Chapter 6 – "Karma"**

* * *

-

…

You wondered who Ice was to me. The infamous 'Killing Ice', his name having carried to far reaches of the kingdom of Rune Midgaard.

You were suspicious about my affiliation with this master of assassination.

I never said you didn't have reason to.

Will you believe me, now, if I tell you that I had no idea who he was?

I don't think…anyone truly did.

…

-

…

Jukuna relieved Ice of his duty to train me.

Whatever good that did.

Still, it should have halted there. It would've progressed no further. I believe it was my doing, this time.

It began with Karma.

…

* * *

-

It was the very next morning Karma returned. I know because I was with Jukuna at that time, as he was testing my skills with stilettos. Karma, with his heavy traveling cloak still draped around him, approaching with the solemn grace which later on I came to recognize as that of a predator's. His purple gaze briefly touched upon me before directing on Jukuna.

"They have arrived there," Karma's soft, velvety voice reported. "Now all we can do is to wait."

Jukuna acknowledged this with a nod, the smooth fall of his long black hair rippling with the movement. "I'm afraid I must trouble you with another task, Karma."

I paused in mid-motion of launching another stiletto. I knew what was coming.

"I need you to get Rusalka's close combat skills in top notch before the next guild contest. No one else will do."

There was a noticeable pause before Karma responded.

"Has there been a problem?" he asked softly, those purple eyes of his never straying away from the guild master.

Jukuna looked at the cloaked figure silently before replying, "No. I just thought we should get started."

Karma inclined his head in a gesture of agreement. "Leave it to me."

-

Karma was a hardened, mysterious man. A man who radiated as much dignity as Ice had radiated danger. His skin was darker than anyone else I've met in the guild, a deep shade of gold that illuminated the amethysts which were his eyes. His hair was thick and abundant, fanning out above his shoulders on their own accord, the blackest I've ever laid eyes on.

"Jukuna told me you desire to become elite," was the first thing he said in his dark, slow voice. He too, had the habit of averting his eyes to my shoulder as to not look at me directly. "I will not be going easy on you."

I had nod in acknowledgement.

"I will not give you any false hopes, Rusalka," Karma told me, circling around me from behind. "From what I hear from Ice, your pretty sword dance won't do you any good if you can't transfer those skills into battle. And…" He held up a stiletto as an example, balancing it perfectly between two fingers. "These will be like child's play against the likes of Siren and Sweet."

He saw the reaction in my eyes, even though he wasn't looking directly at me.

"That's right, Rusalka," Karma confirmed. Even though he used my name, the way he spoke, as he'd always spoken, was politely distant. "To be able to rise into the rank of elite, you must better all who challenge you during the contest…and even one of _us_."

He blinked, set the dagger aside. "Since Art was recruited into the guild two years ago, no one else has passed. He raised the standard a bit." A pause. "Not to mention everyone has been training harder," Karma added.

I listened and understood his words. I told him what I couldn't tell Jukuna; "I can't do it…"

His eyes flickered over mine. "I never meant that. As I said; I won't go easy on you."

He tossed me something. Two metal rods with a lengthy strip of thick red ribbon connecting from one to the other. I stretched it out curiously.

"If we're talking in terms of power and skills, you would stand no chance. However...Watch."

Karma showed me something in his hand. It was a pinecone the size of his palm. I wondered where he got it from. Pines weren't indigenous to Comodo.

He clenched the pinecone in his hand, his knuckles whitened as crunching sounds came from the snapping of the thorns. I stared as blood eventually began to glimmer on the splintered edges of the pinecone.

"Karma…what are you…?" I tried to ask.

He was hurting himself. I didn't know what to do.

Thankfully he released his death grip on the disfigured object. I saw that the thorns had cut into his uncovered hand as he tried to crush it by force.

"Now watch," Karma told me nonchalantly.

He took the rods from me, gripping them with one hand. With his other hand he tossed the pinecone up and swung the rods with the other. Somehow with that swing he looped the ribbon around the airborne object gracefully. He snapped his arm downwards. The pinecone shattered against the wooden floor.

"Do you understand…what I just showed you?" his dark, breathless voice questioned.

I admit my main focus was still on his bleeding hand. I wondered if he felt it.

"I found a way you can win…" Karma told me.

"From what I know, Passion Gale is a fancy fast motion sword style, one that trains the practitioner to be ambidextrous and to develop perfect timing. That, along with your sense of accuracy which Jukuna confirmed this morning, will allow you to adapt to what I will teach you rather quickly."

He reached on top of the weapon drawer and took a sheet of scented cloth to clean up the blood. "Since our time is short, I can only teach you one style. The Nest."

Karma gestured for me to step back so I lined up with him. "This is a difficult whip style, Rusalka," he explained, "and not commonly practiced, which will work to your advantage. However it is not practiced by many for a reason; it has a major weakness."

-

…

I'm getting ahead of myself.

The truth is I'm not exactly that sure if this is what he said; all he said. You see, Karma was a silent man. I do not think I remember correctly how much of what I'm recounting to you that he actually said then and what else he might've mentioned later on, as time went by. Maybe even some of these are blanks which I've filled in myself.

All I know is that this is what I _heard._

You must remember that this is not a perfect story.

…

-

I nodded, waiting for him to go on.

"There are no offensive moves," he told me. "All the power you output is transferred from your opponent's attacks. In other words, you may only counter."

With slow, gliding steps, he traced a small circle on the floor. "This is your nest," he told me. "You are a bird defending your nest. Never move outside of the spiral. Never let anyone at your nest from behind."

I backed away automatically as he snapped the "whip", the ribbon causing an echo as it met the hard wooden surface of the floor.

"As a beginner, you should follow this rule; if there is a center, you must maintain the center of the space you are in. You must locate yourself out in the open. You absolutely must be able to defend your ground, no matter how vulnerable that might seem to make you." His purple gaze turned to me and he added, "A bird must guard its nest."

It seemed that, at that point, he was debating something with himself. "Let's see…who can I get to demonstrate this with…" Karma folded his arms and pondered out loud. "Ice is probably away on his mission now that I've returned. Go out to the field and see if Little Bird is there."

* * *

-

I went as he asked.

I knew who Little Bird was. His was an appearance hard to forget. I did find him out on the field, spotted him easily. His metallic copper hair shone under the sun as he labored.

I drew closer to get a better look. I was curious about what he was doing.

He looked up, met me with one reddish brown eye. The other one, which he kept hidden behind a curtain of his unique hair, I now know to be a glowing amber color.

"Hello there," Little Bird greeted me, returning his attention to the soil and his spade. "Want to help me cultivate aloes?"

Karma only told me to see if Little Bird was out in the field. But I suppose it was rude to leave so abruptly without replying.

I looked across the field. Rows and rows of plants were neatly lined in the sandy soil. There seemed to be different species of plants organized into sections.

"What are these plants?" I found myself asking.

"Aloes," Little Bird responded casually as he worked, "from all different parts of the world with dry soil. I'm seeing if I can grow them here. Many have medicinal uses."

I've always known there was something peculiar about him; Little Bird, aside from his unusual traits. Here when almost everyone else spent their free time practicing their skills…he was growing plants.

I asked him as much. "Why are you growing these?"

I think he knew what I meant. Perhaps it was not the first time someone had wondered.

"Anyone can destroy life," he told me, "but it takes true skill to give or to sustain life."

-

…

Yes, that was what you've told me, too.

But I'm afraid it was a long time before I even began to understand.

…

Majesty…

…

-

"So is there a reason you came all the way out here to see me?" Little Bird asked conversationally as he dusted his hands off.

"Ah…" That made me remember. "Karma wanted me to see if you'll be here…"

"Oh, I see." He got up. "He wants to speak with me, then. Show me to him."

* * *

-

"Welcome back," Little Bird greeted Karma with a light punch on his shoulder. "You need something from me?"

Karma tossed him what looked like a pair of leather gloves. With dangerous looking blades protruding out of where the knuckles were. Little Bird caught them and examined them before looking back at the man with an incredulous expression.

"Are you serious?" Little Bird asked.

"I need you to come at me with all you've got," Karma explained, lazily unraveling his ribbon.

Little Bird looked like he was about to protest, shrugged, hesitated as he pulled on those gloves, and shrugged again. "Very well. I guess I don't have to worry about accidentally hurting _you_, anyway," he commented with a grin. Right away he fell into a fighting stance, fists raised in front of him. "Let's go."

I saw him charge at Karma, saw Karma snapped his whip forward, which somehow entwined around Little Bird's striking arm. Little Bird went skidding along the wooden surface of the floor.

"…Why didn't I see that coming?" Little Bird wondered out loud as he lay staring up at the ceiling. He leapt to his feet, shrugging the ceases out of his white see-through vest. "Alright. Again."

The very next instant, it seemed, he was down on his back again. Karma had swung one metal rod around his ankle and had tripped him when he pulled on both ends.

"Psch…" He rose back up, slowly this time. "All this is, is guided evasion," Little Bird remarked.

"Work around it, then," Karma told him calmly.

So Little Bird went at him again, this time slashing in half the ribbon when it came near him. I don't think he expected Karma to be able to wind a severed ribbon around each of his wrists, employing the momentum of his own attack to swing him half-flying away.

"…Ow…" Little Bird groaned, not even bothering to get up again.

"So you see, Rusulka," Karma drew my attention to him. "This style uses gentle, guiding moves to direct harm back at the offender, as so not to disturb the nest itself."

"I understand," I told him. "Please teach me."

-

…

And I suppose that was the first step to becoming…what I became. I even asked to be taught.

It was only for my self defense in the beginning.

Will you believe me?

…

* * *

-

"Tell me about Ice," I remember asking Karma. He and I were putting things away in their proper place after one of our training sessions. I'm not sure if it's the second or third day. All I know is that the question had been on my mind for a while.

Karma's purple gaze trailed to me lazily, but he continued putting the stilettos we used for that session back neatly lined on their tray.

"I'm afraid there's nothing I can tell you," he said casually. "There is not much I know about that man."

Some of my surprise must have shown in my eyes, because he glanced at me again and said, "When you become an elite of this guild, none of the other elites are supposed to question your past, unless you offer to say it. To try to find out without their given consent is a clear gesture of disrespect and distrust. Do you understand what I'm saying?"

I had nodded, once, slowly. I did not fully understand. What I did understand is that this had to do with the reason Jukuna wanted me amongst the Elites.

"Though, I suppose," Karma added, "if you are really curious… _You_ can perhaps find out. If you're not afraid."

He left me with that. I watched him leave the practice hall and replayed all he said in my mind. Did he mean that it was okay if a non-elite questioned the identity of an elite? I didn't think so. But the way he said it…the way he glanced back at me with his amethyst eyes at the door before going away.

I wondered if he wanted me to.

Find out about Ice, I mean.

Besides, if I had something, anything, to use against him, didn't it mean that he'll leave me alone with my own past?

I have my doubts about being able to become an elite.

But you see, for whatever the reason, I decided that I will find out.

And I knew where to start.


	8. Little Bird

A/N: lol…no need to be intimidated by the chapter titles. You do _not_ have to try and remember _all_ the characters or names. Think of this as an orally told story.

* * *

**Chapter 7 – "Little Bird"**

* * *

-

…

There were times my fear failed me. Now that I think about it… I wondered about this emotion, fear, and if it was the same as what you felt – what everyone else felt.

So many things would have been different.

I wonder…

But I wonder about a lot of things.

…

* * *

-

…

For instance, when I stood in front of Ice's private quarters, I was hesitating. It wasn't that I was afraid he'll find out. I knew he wouldn't be returning that day.

It was because I knew. I knew whatever it is that I'll find out will change things. Irreversibly. There was always such price for knowledge.

And knowing so did not stop me.

The door was not locked, in any way. I did wonder _why_ it was not locked, but it did not hold me back. Either that no one would possibly bother to look for something here…or that they were terribly afraid to dare such a thing.

You see, that had been Karma's…mistake; I could not feel _fear_. Not that way.

Otherwise I wouldn't have. It wouldn't have. Gone that far.

…

-

What I felt once I was inside the room was not fear, no not fear. I felt a touch of awe, very similar to when the first time Ice took me there. Because there was a sense of identity in that room. Each item in there: the various types of weapons scattered about, the piles of unfamiliar clothing, and other collections such as the jars of different sizes lined up on the shelves, things which all added a little detail to their owner. I might have even felt a little…envious. But I didn't dwell on that thought.

I went to the rectangular table placed near the center the center of the room. It was the only table I could see which wasn't completely stacked with things on top. In fact, it was almost clear, save for the few items which had demanded my notice the first time I laid my eyes on them.

Could Ice read?

Books were rare. I knew this even then. They were expensive and hard to come by because they were copied by hand, by scribes. But it wasn't the gold-leafed covers which called to me; neither the ornately decorated ones nor the thick black books which gave the impression of being instruction manuals.

I remember flipping open the covers of the leather-bound books gently. My eyes scanned the immaculate letters done in black ink. I examined another book. I must admit I had no clue what the words really meant, but it did bother me. It was a logbook, or at least, gave every indication of being one.

Need I say more?

I was leafing through the fourth book in my arms when a sheet fell out. Picking up the sheet of paper, I saw that it was like a journal entry, written in personalized handwriting, the date at one corner. I slipped it back into the fold of the page it came from. I had no intention of reading uninvited into someone else's personal life.

However, upon turning the page, I found another loose sheet. Blinking, I flipped through the next few pages, finding the same scenario. They were not journal entries. The handwriting was noticeably different on each one. The spacing between the lines varied. The pieces of paper which were written on were of different qualities.

These were not journal entries.

They were letters.

For a while I stared unseeingly down at the large book which lay in my arms. Thoughts ran though my mind. Strange musings. I mentally shook myself and clapped the book shut softly, but before I made to put it down back where it was before, the corner of a slip of paper which came loose dangled out from the very end of the book. I propped the book down and reached to nudge the thing back in where it belonged, but the sight of it stopped me.

I ended up taking it out instead. Because the words on it were printed neatly in block letters like the ones on the notices put up in the circus. That's why it caught my eyes. A notice. I couldn't help but to scan over it.

_'…-following the assassination of his wife and the disappearance of his only son, the Duke of Lazreagues has since made massive fortifications on his stronghold, and had commissioned a highly famed mercenary guild, the Chimera, to bestow vengeance upon his enemy.' _

It went on into details of the Duke's patronage of the radical guild, Chimera, and my eyes browsed past all of this. Right to the bottom of the page.

_'…-the Duke of Lazreagues desires that his son, the marquis, abandon his quest for revenge and to return home. He will pay anyone who can provide information on the marquis' whereabouts or to deliver this message to him. The subject mentioned is a fair-skinned man of strong build and above-average height, sporting dark blue eyes and-…' _I blinked, unsure at first why my mind wandered._ '-…and very light blonde hair,'_ it read.

I hesitated. I didn't know if I wanted to do this. My hand reached and tugged one of the letters halfway out. That was all it took.

It was only when I finally put everything in its proper place did I come to terms with what I've seen.

…

_'…-and everything is set out as you had instructed, my liege. You only need give us a signal. We will wait patiently for further notifications…'_

I felt a chill settle in me.

Ice.

* * *

-

"Where is Karma?" I asked Little Bird when I saw him.

"He had urgent matters to attend to," the well-muscled man told me casually, greeting me with a smile. "So he asked me to help with your training today."

"…Oh," I say. I was quiet. I was always that way; speechless, but Little Bird didn't know that. He took my silence for something else.

"Do you need to see him about something?" the copper-haired man asked me.

"No," I tell him, "I was just wondering."

Little Bird nodded and grinned. "Come on, I'll go easy on you."

It was only an quarter of an hour into our first sparring did he realize that he didn't need to go easy on me. Not as easy as he'd thought, anyway. He told me as such.

"Whoa. I can understand how Karma does it so well – he grew up with the gypsies – but how did you pick it up so fast in a matter of days?" he asked me, pausing for a break. I looked at him, but did not answer.

So Karma, too, had been trained by gypsies at one point. I suspected as much. His appearance was compatible to the troupes of gypsies who'd sometimes pass through or interact with the Green Deviruchi.

I suppose there was a hidden question underlying his words, and I did not want to complicate things any further. Somehow, Jukuna's warning to his guild members to stay away from me was already wearing down. Though they remained cautious. Yes, cautious.

"I apologize," Little Bird said to me, noting my lack of response, "I did not mean to ask about what you might feel uncomfortable discussing right now. Forgive me?"

I hesitated in offering a reply, because I wasn't sure what it was that he was asking forgiveness for. But what would've been an uncomfortable silence was interrupted by a female voice calling out in a singing tone, "Little Bird!" outside.

That was my first impression on Charisma, the bow-mistress from the sector of the Crow residing in Payon. She squealed and threw herself on Little Bird when she saw him and told him darkly, directly into his ear, "We're taking you back with us this time."

Little Bird laughed good-naturedly, effectively shrugging off the tension created by her meaningful words. "Charisma, you guys sure are early this time. Taking measures to make sure you get here on time this year?" He looked over her shoulder, but found no one there. "Sky is with you, right? Who'd you guys bring this time to try and bump me off this paradise of a town?"

The woman rolled her sensual brown eyes. "Wayinka, love. Finally convinced him to go for elite. Hence why I say…" She winked at Little Bird. "You're ours now."

Little Bird raised an eyebrow, despite returning her grin. "I don't think I'll have the chance of returning to Payon with you, anyway, if Sky catches us like this."

Charisma leaned towards his ear again and told him, "We have an _open _relationship. He won't say a thing."

"Uh…" Little Bird was fortunate that Charisma looked over to me. I saw him smile and shook his head behind her back.

"Who's this? New blood?" The woman paced a semi-circle in front of me. "Charmed," she remarked.

"Jukuna's-…" I heard Little Bird say as if in a warning.

"Jukuna's?" Charisma repeated incredulously, with a strange look in his direction to match.

"…-sister," he added.

She turned her bewitching eyes back on me. She stared for quite some time. "Hrm…She does feel like him. Same silence. Same hair. Her eyes are brighter, though," Charisma observed. She turned to look at Little Bird. "So she's a new candidate, huh? Is she good? Should I be worried about Wayinka?"

Little Bird answered her by the way of a little smile.

Charisma scoffed, blowing a strand of her hair away from her vision. "Right. What else could be expected from Jukuna's own sister? Well…" She drew back and waved a hand dismissively. "I want to go see the others before Sky comes to find me regarding any assignment Jukuna might want us to take care of while we're here." She nodded towards me. "I'm looking forward to you joining our rank, love. Train hard."

Upon heading out, she tapped Little Bird on his chest. "And you. You should go for the rank-up as well. Never know who'll make it."

She left. I glanced at Little Bird. "You have no desire to become an Elite?" I asked curiously.

"Nope," he told me readily, "I horde no desire to overestimate myself. The authority does not appeal to me, and their job is the hardest of us all, involving many direct confrontations with guild enemies."

Guild enemies.

"Who…" I trailed off at first. Again I was faced with the decision of whether or not I really want to ask. To find out. "…Who are the guild enemies?" I asked quietly. If he didn't hear me, I would not repeat myself.

He did hear me. "Wow, Jukuna really brought you into this without telling you anything, huh?"

"I want to…hear it from you."

There was a delay before Little Bird replied to my question. A small expanse of time where his eyes went dead. The tiniest gestures which held no significance, then. They all come back to me now.

"I'm sorry, I'll tell you. I was just surprised you asked. This is nothing to be belittled, Rusalka. I've had someone important to me killed by a guild enemy before. I thought Jukuna would've warned you of the dangers."

-

…

_Did_ he warn me?

I suppose, in a strange, roundabout way, he did.

'Do not get close.'

…

-

I came to when Little Bird waved his hand tentatively in front of my eyes. "…Rusalka?"

I blinked up at his reddish brown eye. He had just let me in on a part of his past, a rather significant part, too.

It was only then when realization hit me. Then, that I realized my mistake. Imagine that. And I was supposed to be _smart_.

"Oh, pardon me," I said. "Let's return to our sparring."

"Eh…didn't you want to know…" Little Bird trailed off. Until now I still don't know what is it that he thought he saw in my eyes, but it would serve to throw up an invisible wall between him and me. I should say – especially between him and me, because he was the one I cut off from.

"…I need to go," I told him. Because I really did felt I needed to. Get away. I felt an urge to distance myself again. Withdraw back to the shadows which hid me.

After all, it did not matter if I was alone or that I was surrounded by people, like how it was in the guild. They will all stare. They will all become suspicious. Only one thing will remain the same.

…

My eternal solitude.

…

"Oh, Rusalka!" Little Bird called after me. I turned to look, indifferently. It occurred to me then that it did not sound right to my ears when anyone besides Jukuna, who gave me that name, to be calling me by Rusalka.

"Karma told me to inform you that he might not be here tomorrow…so…"

I believe it was an awkward silence which fell upon us.

"However, Ice might be back, so I'll…"

I did not hear the rest of his sentence. I walked away.

* * *

-

"You're still awake?" Jukuna asked me, gently draping a cape over my shoulders as he came up from behind on the balcony. "What is the matter? Are you anxious?"

"You already know there is a spy here," I said to him without turning. "Why won't you tell me?"

Jukuna, my master, was not one who could be stunned so easily. Indeed, I suspect he already predicted I would find out as much. He came up beside me and leaned his arms on the railing like I was doing and said, "I do not wish for you to be involved in that matter, Rusalka. Hence why I warned you to not get close to anyone. A girl even as sharp as you can be easily misled into believing the wrong person."

And love is blind. Is that it?

Jukuna reached over and brushed my hair, gently. "Because you are close to me now, Rusalka, my countless enemies have become your enemies. Many would want to harm you, or to use you against me. Whether or not you want to hurt, hate, mistrust, you will. I have led you out of the _garden_."

He sounded apologetic, the last part. I did not know what garden he was talking about, but I answered him.

"You have called to me and so I followed you. I will walk this world with you."

"I have but one request, Jukuna," I added after a brief pause.

He looked over to me expectantly. "Name it, and I will find it in my power to make it yours."

I looked aside, for I could not meet his eyes even in the dark when I asked.

"I do not wish to try to become an Elite."


	9. Sweet

* * *

**Chapter 8 – "Sweet"**

* * *

- 

Ice had not returned the next morning. But neither had Karma.

I passed the day leaning out on a windowsill on the second floor, watching the archers preparing for the contest from a distance. Both Sky and Charisma from Payon were archers, with excellent dexterity and marksmanship. I could only assume that Charisma remarked something which offended Lai, who was with them down on the archery range, for she left wordlessly and abruptly.

One of the men turned questioningly to Charisma, and seemed to ask her why she did that. I assumed that one was Sky.

I had half the intention to go downstairs, talk to Lai, and maybe find out what happened. But I knew to do that was dangerous. Yesterday, Little Bird had come too close to the truth only through sparring with me, with his comment on Karma's past relation with gypsies.

You never know if the smallest bits of information will reach the wrong ears with dire consequences. Especially if you don't even know who it is that you must watch out for. Jukuna would not tell me, no.

But if you get the impression that I was distancing myself because I was afraid, it was not so. That was by my own choice.

I could not afford to endanger Jukuna.

Back down on the field, the three archers returned to their practicing, Charisma and Sky turning to give Wayinka tips and instructions every now and then. They were serious about getting Wayinka to the rank of Elite. As I watched them, the words of Jukuna drifted back to me.

…

_"If that is what you wish, I shall not force you to try, Rusalka. It is indeed doubtful that it would be of import in the grand scheme of things. Though I do hope you will reconsider."_

_…_

As I made my way downstairs, I spied Little Bird sparring with another guild mate with whom I've made no contact with before. I moved on before they could notice me.

It seemed like everyone was preparing or was helping someone prepare. For what? What was it about being elite that made it so desirable, I wonder?

Even as I pondered this I knew enough reasons. I admit I was cunning enough to see why the position offered benefits to the loyal and…the not so loyal.

And then, because it was the beginning of evening and shadows were lengthened by the vertical beams of light from the descending sun, he emerged from the shadows, leisurely, and as if he might has well been waiting for me all day.

I stopped short when I saw him step into the light clearly.

Ice.

-

He folded his arms in front of him, turning sideways so that he wasn't directly facing me. I suppose it was an attempt on his part to not threaten me as much. He wasn't looking at me when he spoke, his eyes instead fixated on a spot beyond the window before him.

"You went through my books. What did you find out?"

I stared. "How-…?" But I caught myself. "-How do you mean?" I asked him.

"Heh," he let out a small, scornful laugh. He looked over to me and uttered in what could've been an amused tone, "Amateur."

I was speechless to that.

"Dust is hard to replace isn't it? Didn't think I'd notice?" Ice asked me lightly. He moved towards me then, just two small, non-aggressive steps. "So. What do you know?"

I did not answer him.

Again, he advanced towards me and I, after a great deal of debating with myself, met his empowering blue eyes and told him boldly, "You can't do anything to me, Ice."

It was fascinating, how his eyes always seemed able to darken according to his mood, the way his predatory presence ebbed and flowed off of him. I believe it was the way he carried himself; the calculating pause between each movement, the shrewd silence between the syllables. If all the unknown mysteries, all the foreboding shadows hidden under the bed, lurking in the uncanny blackness of the corners late at night, took on a form and a name, that would be our Ice.

"Do you really think so…?" his light venomous voice inquired. I stood still and looked ahead blankly as he drew near. I could no longer hold his eyes.

"Answer me, Rusalka," Ice asked of me, as he began pacing a circle around me. "What did you see?"

I was innocent enough to think that as long as Jukuna was there, there was no way he could touch me. Innocent enough back then.

…

Did you think I started out like this?

Heh…

"You are a spy," I say quietly.

"You are mistaken," he replied, a malicious hiss lacing his voice. I could not see his face for he was behind me.

"You are the Marquis of Lazreagues."

He grabbed hold of my arm from behind. And even though I had expected something of the sort, I flinched nonetheless. It had pained me, and he seemed to have realized this, for his grip loosened and with his other hand, drew the cape away from my shoulders.

"What are you-…"

Ice cut me off, asking with low, murderous intent, "Who did this to you?"

I had blinked in confusion. "What…?" It was only when I attempted to pull my arm away did I realize what he meant. The abundant number of cuts and bruises on my skin was visible on my bare arms and shoulders.

"Who?" he demanded again.

"Oh….these…?" I glanced up and faltered under his glare. "…Karma…he-…"

"Karma?" Ice repeated, his eyes narrowing dangerously. "Why?"

I knew that we were straying far from where we started, and I looked at him, wondering if he noticed, but I answered him.

"He has been training me."

Ice let go of me. He took a step back and crossed his arms again. "All these from training? For what?"

I wasn't sure what to say. I didn't know why, but I got the impression that it would be better if Ice didn't know about what Jukuna had planned.

"I'll have to have a word with him," Ice drawled.

"That is not necessary," I told him. "I-…I gave up."

I felt his eyes on me. The weight of his gaze was unmatched by anyone else I've met thus far. It was as if he could read into the souls of others in the deep silence which always preceded his words.

"Gave up for the contest, did you?" he had guessed correctly, causing me to look up. "Might as well," he told me lazily, "I don't suppose you have it in you."

He saw the curiosity in my eyes, I think, and cocked his head to one side as he pondered over me. "I see Karma forgot to tell you something important." He continued before I could ask. "He can try and train you as much as humanly possible within two week's time, and it will get you nowhere."

I kept my eyes on him questioningly.

"You want to know why?" He might have been smirking under his facemask; his eyes seemed to be mocking me. "The contest is in fact an exam, as you know, but not only to test your skills…"

He drew closer again, and it was the first time I've seen him that close. His eyes were like swirling lakes of blue. I say swirling because they seemed alive, more _real_ than anyone else's that I've seen.

"…It is to see if you have the capacity to _kill_," Ice told me softly, "and to see if you have the capacity to go up against a guild mate with the intention to _kill_."

…

Yes. That's how it was like.

"…Because it could very well turn out that the one who was closest to you…is the one who'll betray you," Ice added with a soft hiss.

I wondered if it was perhaps his sorrow which bled over to me. There was no other explanation I could find to answer why I felt disheartened at his words.

"Like Khadori?" I had asked, perhaps daringly so.

Ice stilled at my words. I averted my eyes. Then he reached towards me suddenly, but it was only to tilt my chin up so I met his eyes again.

"Is that what they told you?" his voice whispered to me. He let out a small chuckle. "You have a lot to learn." He released me and looked at me several seconds longer. "No, you don't have what it takes."

Not that I intended to prove him wrong, but I wanted to know what he meant. So I asked him, "What do you mean, Ice?"

It seemed as if he wasn't about to reply. He stepped back and was about to turn away, but he paused in mid-motion and glanced back at me. "I'll give you a hint, Rusalka; everyone in the Elite, no matter how soft-spoken or sweet-tempered they might seem; everyone is a killer here. Do you think you'll belong?"

He was tempting me again. Heh, he was probably expecting me to correct him automatically, which I didn't do this time. It was because this time I knew what he was doing, and he noticed this. We read it in each other's eyes.

"I know what you think of me, Ice," I told him steadily. "I didn't kill them."

"Heh." Ice turned his back to me and said thoughtfully, "You should know it takes more than just your word to convince people. Especially if the evidence is against you, Rusalka."

Cold. He was so cold.

As he started walking away again, he said, "I'll make a deal with you. Speak not of who I am, and I will not bring up your...questionable past."

"I will not keep quiet if I find out that you are a threat to Jukuna!" I called after him quietly. If he thought that was going to buy my silence, then he was mistaken.

He paused, to show that he heard me. "Do you think it's wise to threaten me?" Ice asked me so lightly I could barely have heard it. The tension between us stretched out and robbed my surrounding of all other sounds. "No, I take that back. I take it all back," he said decidedly, but in a mocking tone of voice.

"If you were indeed foolish, you would've told someone already, what you found out. I guess you're not as naïve as I first thought."

I pursed my lips and said nothing.

"You think I'm a spy?" Ice asked with a tinge of amusement evident in his voice. "I am not as bad as you think, Rusalka," he told me, resuming his walk. "…I am much, much worse."

Ice…

-

…

I was given another chance then, to leave things as they should be. But as you can see, it didn't happen that way. I know, I was foolish. I'm everything you wish I weren't.

I have become your bane.

But I didn't get here without help, you know.

…

* * *

- 

It was in fact, the very next morning when this took place. This took place out in front, the courtyard – I say courtyard because that's the best word I can find to describe it. Karma had just returned, and I went with Jukuna to receive him. Jukuna then left us alone, for Karma, after hearing my decision to halt my training, wanted me to stay and explain it to him. And, because he was a silent man, and I myself unable to find any words to say, we remained in expectant silence.

Ice came across then, stopping at the top of the front steps of the guildhall when he saw us. You see, no one usually comes out to the front yard; it was quite small and only served as a temporary place to unload supplies or to assemble before heading out. And since Ice did not seem to have donned any form of gear or clothing for heading out, I could only conclude that he was there to see Karma's return.

His vivid blue eyes glanced at me for a moment, and then rested on Karma's inquiring purple ones. "I'd like to discuss something with you, Karma. Regarding your training with Rusalka," he said casually.

I believe I shot him a wide-eyed look, but he didn't look back at me. Did he not believe me when I told him there was no need? I glanced down at myself, satisfied that any injury I might have gotten from training was covered up by long sleeves and loose pants. No one would know I was paying the price of wanting to go from inexperienced to skilled in a matter of two weeks.

So why was Ice doing this?

After a long pause, Karma rose higher. "Speak."

The budding conversation was interrupted when we heard the front gates open.

Sweet came into view, her dark cloak worn with desert sand and beach soil.

"…Sweet," Ice addressed her disheartened form. "Where are the others?"

Karma remained unmoving, unspeaking. He only turned when Jukuna's voice filtered through the thick blanket of silence wrapped around the woman.

"You're back," the guild master observed. "Are Art and Siren not with you?"

"I-…" the strawberry blonde breathed as if the air was too thick for her to take in. "I had great respect for you, Jukuna," she finally whispered, not lifting her eyes up once from the distant spot on the ground she stared unseeingly at.

"Ice, Karma," Jukuna ordered, seemingly unaffected by her words, "take her to Maven and have him tend to her wounds." He told Sweet before leaving, "You need not report to me directly, nor tell anyone until you've recovered enough."

After Jukuna left, I saw Ice and Karma exchange a long, indecipherable look. "Before we leave," Karma said slowly, "what were you going to tell me?"

It seemed that Ice hesitated. He might've been reconsidering. But after a short pause, he repeated, "Regarding Rusalka's training…" His blue eyes flickered over me before returning to Karma. "Leave it to me."

I felt hostility pass between the two, felt it as surely as the morning sun upon my skin.

Ours was a broken guild.

"If Rusalka herself wants to learn from you-…" Karma didn't complete his sentence. Ice was already walking away.

I saw it for what it was. Ice knew that I could not turn it down, for he knew things of my past he shouldn't know, and I him. I saw it as a blackmailing, of sorts.

"Don't worry, Karma," I said, "I do want to learn from him."

Karma was not one to have ever tried to convince me of anything, and he saw that I had made my decision. So he left me be, but not without a warning.

"That man is more dangerous than you should imagine."

He then went over to Sweet, who still stood blankly where she was. He offered to take her traveling cloak, but she made no response. Finally he voluntarily took the cloak away from around her shoulders.

I saw wounds. A lot of dried blood.

"I will get clean clothes for you," Karma told her gently. She interrupted, her tone of voice in sharp contrast to his.

"He might as well have pronounced us all dead before we set off on this mission," she spat. "I know me and Siren were only allowed to live because that wizard _wanted _someone to make it back, bearing all the wounds. Mine were lighter than Siren's, though. He leapt in to shield Art." Sweet swayed on her feet a bit as she said this. "Leave me alone for a bit."

Karma nodded.

"Rusalka," she halted me as I was about to make my leave after Karma.

I turned back. I found it strange that she would call my name.

Her green eyes lifted to meet mine.

"Leave Ice to me," she told me. I blinked.

"You can not give him happiness," she continued to say.

"You are not of the same world."


	10. Jukuna

* * *

**Chapter 9 – "Jukuna"**

* * *

-

"Jukuna is a cold and calculating man," Ice told me in a cool, arrogant whisper while handing me a chalice of wine. "He has made sacrifices before. He will make them again."

He poured me a chalice of wine and handed it to me. Perhaps he felt that I needed it. Slipping off his facemask unheedingly, Ice drank from his own cup.

It was quiet in the backyard cabin he claimed for himself. The only illumination in the room came in through the skylights up on the high ceiling. Particles of dust caught the light and gleamed as they rose and fell with the disturbance his movements caused. He did not feel like a messenger of death then, when his eyes were not fixed upon me, but instead cast a far-away look into his surroundings. His pure platinum colored hair in sharp contrast to the frame of dark eyelashes shielding his eyes, as if they grew that dark to shelter his light-sensitive eyes.

There was an invisible space between us, and I later realized this must be what Sweet meant.

A world of darkness apart.

That is how he would remain in my memory; surreal, untouchable.

…

"Jukuna knows there is none better than I who can teach you within this short amount of time," Ice said. His words sank in slowly.

I did not ask him why Jukuna didn't trust me with him in the first place, but I had asked…

"Are you…better than Karma?" I had asked.

The silence stretched out. I did not know if I offended him.

…I could not tell.

-

…

No, I do not think I remember this correctly. I'm starting to get a little weary from recalling all this after all… I think I skipped a bit ahead, let me fix that.

…

You wanted to know everything, didn't you? Then please... I know we don't have all the time in the world anymore but…

This will be the last time you'll hear from me…

Your Majesty…

…

-

I remember…

"Is Art dead?" I remember asking him quietly. That was when he handed me the chalice of wine.

"That is not for me to tell you," he told me in that characteristic arrogant whisper of his. "Why not ask Jukuna, yourself?"

Perhaps he still held a grudge against Jukuna…because of what happened with that traitor, Khadori…or it could be anything else. There was scorn in his voice, though it was barely audible.

"Jukuna is a cold and calculating man. He has made such sacrifices before, and will do so again."

I clutched the glass chalice with both hands and did not know what to say.

He raised his own chalice to his lips and drank from it.

After a moment of silence, Ice peered at me through his eyelashes. "A leader who is merciless to his followers as his enemies, is that what you want?" Ice wanted to know, a wry smile twisting the corner of his mouth.

I stared at him curiously.

"I'm offering you an alternative, Rusalka," he said softly, venomously.

_Spy._

That one word resounded inside my head.

…

"…Jukuna is my master. I will obey him unconditionally."

And I meant what I said. He could tell. Now that I think of it… He always had a way of knowing. It made him all that much dangerous.

…

The only sound I heard was the soft clink of his metal bracer against the bottom of the glass chalice in his hand. I suppose it would've been rude if I didn't try the wine he offered, and I was about to loosen my facemask when he grabbed my arm unexpectedly, forcefully.

"Fool."

He said that with so much distaste, I couldn't help but to feel alarmed.

"Never accept anything offered without checking first," Ice commanded coldly.

I blinked at him in confusion.

"Look again."

There was a tiny bit of difference, but it was there, floating almost indiscernibly on the surface of the liquid.

… I had been watching him the whole time. And yet I did not even see when he'd poisoned my wine.

"They are training you wrong," Ice told me, with just a light touch of distaste in his voice. "There is no way you can become good enough to defeat one of us in a matter of weeks. It is a foolish notion. What you should be learning instead…" He gazed at me through veiled eyes. "…is how to not be killed."

"Jukuna has a lot of enemies, and in turn they will be your enemies," Ice told me, pulling me out a chair. "But it is not a confrontation you should be worried about…it is assassination."

"Though there are hostile guilds, none of them have yet declared war. But they have other means …"

Ice leaned on the table beside me, clearing the table off to make room, causing several insignificant objects to fall off in the process.

"The flick of a fan, a prick of a needle, the flipping of a book…It does not matter how many people are guarding you, there will be a way."

"And I will show you what I can," he promised me.

Something small and round which fell off the table rolled into me.

He was speaking again.

"When the previous ruler, Tristan VI died, his half-brother succeeded him. The new king immediately assembled an Elite Guard to protect his person. And why not?" Ice asked. "The kingdom was in a state of chaos, and much less ready to accept a half-blooded monarch."

I reached down and picked up the object. It was a jade band…a ring…I've seen it before, lying on the table that time I've been looking through his journals.

"He hired famous bodyguards who never left his side. He had servants who tested all his food. He, himself, never left the safety of his palace. Nonetheless, in less than two months, Rune Midgaard was again without a king…"

Ice let out a wry smile, noticing the ring in my hand. "Like it?" He took it when I offered it to him. "It belonged to someone special…" He held it up and turned it as if he could see things on its surface that I could not. "…Someone long gone."

For some reason he handed it back to me, even though I was not its owner. Curiously, I ran my fingers along its smooth surface, and then slipped it on my finger.

"You wanted to know which one of us, me or Karma, is better…" Ice said softly, "…I do not know. But you might hear otherwise from others…" A soft smile, an ambiguous one.

'_Killing Ice,'_ he said.

"Does the name not mean anything to you?"

…

I shook my head slightly. He gave a nonchalant shrug, and his eyes landed on his ring that I've tried on and was starting to pull off.

"…Fits you."

* * *

-

…

But I couldn't have asked Jukuna. Asked him about Art's mission, I mean. And when I went to see Karma that evening, he glanced over at me from his task of checking the weaponry, and shook his head.

"Sweet has not yet spoken to neither Jukuna nor I."

Nor had she told any of the other members, I could tell from the worrisome look in their eyes.

But she had told Ice. I can't say I remember how I knew this… Many ways, I suppose, and justifiable by none alone.

Well…

I searched for Sweet. I found her by herself in a spacious, light-filled room guild members used for an alternative storage space. It was also the space Art used to store and do his paintings, in an excruciatingly slow pace. That didn't mean he didn't get a lot done, however.

He had done many, many face portraits… Portraits of guild members and people I didn't recognize. I noted Karma, Ice, and Sweet were not there, for he did not know their faces.

…But I was.

Momentarily distracted from Sweet, who was watching, I reached out and touched my face that he had done. I do not know if it looked like me… I have never seen myself smile…even if it was only a sad, half-smile.

"If we receive no news in two days stating that their conditions are stabilized," Sweet's bitter voice reminded me of what I went there for, "then I'm afraid there's no one but Jukuna to blame."

"…Why…?" I had whispered while gazing at the ground.

"He knew very well that Sethron wouldn't accept his proposal," Sweet hissed, coming up close. Her green eyes flashed with emotion. I recalled that Sethron was the name of the high wizard heading that guild…

Majesta.

"…And yet he sent us to him. _I _am only here right now because Sethron needed a messenger. To forward his answer." Sweet smiled, loosening her grip on her arms because the action caused blood to start seeping through the clean bandages again.

"His answer is 'no', Rusalka," the strawberry blond hissed to me. "He will stop at nothing…not unless _she _tells him to."

That's right…

…_Her._

"Pray, if you know how, Rusalka…" Sweet told me, before walking lightly away.

* * *

-

"Who was she?" I had asked Ice when I looked to see him examining the ring again. It was him who taught me how to pick locks. It was he who had me learn by practicing on the collection of locks and chests he had horded in his cabin.

"Someone I should have protected, but didn't," was his soft reply.

I asked nothing else, and went back to what I was doing; unlocking containers to which the keys have been lost. Either he was lying about the keys, or he was uninterested in finding time to lock-pick them himself.

Parchment, gold coins, jewels, and small glass containers I assumed to be poison.

When I reached for a particularly plain-looking wooden box, however, he made move as if to stop me.

"…Not this one?" I had inquired.

He drew his hand back. "No, see if you can unlock this one."

I couldn't. I inserted the lock-pick into the hole and knew immediately, as I used it to probe around, that it would be nigh impossible for me to do.

"I thought not," Ice stated when he saw me give up after only a few minutes. "That box is never meant to be opened."

"What lies inside…?"

"The reason I am damned for life," he replied melodically. With a small smile, he slipped his facemask back on and left me.

* * *

-

"Rusalka…"

I paused in the corridor and looked around. Sweet came into view from behind the shadows. I simply waited for her to speak.

"I hear Ice is training you…"

I did not know what to make of that…

"…Aren't you getting assistance from Karma?" I asked her quietly. Her green eyes squinted slightly, and I couldn't tell if she was frowning or smiling.

"Hn. At the contest, a week from now. I want you to face me."

Yes, her meaning was clear.

"I challenge you to a match, Rusalka."

That was all she wanted to tell me. She started to leave but I asked her, "Why?"

Her back was turned to me. For a long moment nothing happened. Then she lifted her head and spoke.

"Because it would be easy to condemn ones we do not understand, wouldn't it, Rusalka? Remember that. You are not of the same world…you would not understand… But I-…I am. I am like him."

Still, I wasn't sure what she was getting at, but I tried anyway. "What makes you think-…"

"Honey," Sweet said sweetly, "everyone else in the guild besides you knows." She tossed me a glance over her shoulder. "Why not confront him about it, if you're brave?"

-

"Ice?" Little Bird asked with an arched brow, "I thought he was with you."

-

"That man? I don't know. He always disappears in and out as he wills," Lai told me with a helpless shrug. Then she stared at me with sparkling eyes. "But, wow. I heard that he's never agreed to train anyone."

-

"I saw him a while ago…not where he went off to." Queen edged closer and whispered to me, "Has he shown you his face yet?"

"Looking for Ice?" a smooth but authoritative voice startled both of us. "He'll be back soon," Karma told us as he swept past without even a glance in our direction.

We watched until the black-haired Elite disappeared out of sight.

"Something's bothering him," Queen observed. She sobered. "Then again…we're all waiting for the news…"

I gave a small bow and took my leave.

There was something bigger, something darker beneath the surface of things, and I knew it even then. It was the beginning of the play Jukuna had staged… I can see it even now.

-

"Rusalka."

He gestured for me to come forward and to hold out my hand.

He gave me something, I took it curiously. It was a bangle, a silver one that was elaborately decorated. The designs hid the hinged opening and clasp where two blades I recognized to be lock-picks pulled out if the bracelet was open. I looked up at his deep blue eyes.

"Keep it with you," he told me.

…I put it on my wrist carefully.

"…Thank you, Ice."

"If there is anything else you need…"

He knew I had something to ask. Or that he expected me to have something to ask. There was a suspenseful pause.

"…Will you tell me about your past?"

His face was expressionless, a perfect mask that I've yet to learn how to master.

"And what if I say no?" he asked with an amused glint in his eyes.

…

I knew I couldn't back down.

"Then I will find out for myself," I told him.

He swept his arms open and gave me a low bow. "As you wish."

'Eventually', I was going to say, but he forestalled it.

"I'll give you three days. If you can find out within three days' time, I will acknowledge your potential and your talent…" Ice said.

'Potential and talent…?' I had wondered, a tad suspicious. "For what…?" I asked him.

His eyes were smirking at me when he replied softly, "…For becoming an assassin."


	11. Ghost

* * *

**Chapter 10 – "Ghost"**

* * *

-

"Rusalka."

I halted at the sound of my name.

"Where are you going, Rusalka?" Karma's inquiring voice came from beside me. I had not noticed him there.

I wasn't sure where I was going, but I had decided to head out. Surely somewhere out there lays the secret I seek.

"Am I not permitted?" I had asked.

"Did Ice send you?" the black-haired man questioned lazily, gazing down at me through veiled eyes.

"No."

It seemed that he was waiting for me to speak further.

"I don't know where," I told him, meeting his eyes. "I'm going to...do some searching."

I believe he smiled at me. After all, hadn't he hinted for me to do so before?

"Is that so?" Karma moved past me. "If you encounter any difficulties, simply state that you are under the protection of Karma," he told me.

"But to do so…" …would mean I have not accomplished it on my own, with my own power.

He heard me. He made his way back to where I was standing, gesturing with one hand for me to look up at his face.

"Rusalka."

I looked him in the eyes like he wanted.

"I'm only making this easy on you, Rusalka, because your quest is a dangerous one…and because you remain hesitant." His amethyst eyes pierced me as he looked down unblinkingly. "Are you sure this is what you really want?" he asked me.

He was, I think, questioning my resolve to pass the contest and to become one of the elite of our guild. For whatever reason, I couldn't find the voice to answer him straight away. Karma nodded once and whispered the words I remember so well.

_'…Once a killer…always a killer.'_

As he moved away, he told me, "If you don't need my influence, then at least I trust you know how to handle a weapon when need be."

-

I stood outside the gate for a long time. I could afford to do that. No one else other than those who knew of the exact guild location came that far into the maze.

I had no idea where I was going, but once I started walking, my feet carried me there.

I went back to my old home. The site my circus, the Green Deviruchi, had been set up at.

It was a windy day. The deserted circus tents bearing our green and white colors flapped loosely against their supports. I wove my way between the tents, finding the place truly and utterly empty. It did not bother me, as I did not expect much else.

I did not linger there.

* * *

-

None of them wished to be approached by me. The ones I met as street performers, they would scuttle away before I came near. Each and every one of them recognized who I was even at a distance.

'Ghost,' they would form that name with their lips, their eyes widening as they said my name.

I did not even recognize all of them from our disbanded circus group. I did not think they were all ex-members of the Green Deviruchi. Wherefore, then, for the behavior?

"You are her, aren't you?" I had a little boy, too young to understand the fear of the adults, ask me. "You're the one he's been looking for."

"He?" I questioned, gazing down at his innocently curious face.

"The White-Cloaked Death."

I stared until his caretaker found him, grabbed him by the arm and ran.

…

…Do you believe in folktales, Majesty…?

…

* * *

-

"…Why are you not inside with everyone else?"

Lai looked up at my question. She had been averting her eyes up till then.

"No, no reason."

I glanced through the arched doorway to guildhall. A set of newcomers from another faction of the guild had arrived for the contest. Everyone had gathered for introductions.

"Rusalka," she said as I began to leave her be. I looked at her seated on the floor, her back against the wall. Her hazel eyes betrayed none of her usual perkiness and mirth. They were cool, serious, and…

"I hear you wish to compete in the contest a week from now."

I did not reply. She knew the answer through my eyes.

"I will not let you win."

The archer got up, rose to her full height as she faced me with determination. "I cannot let you win. I must past the exam. _I _must become Elite."

I did not know how to respond to her.

"If you wish to stand in my way…"

Ice's voice interrupted. "Rusalka, are you not coming in?"

Lai didn't glance at him or acknowledge his presence. But then, neither did he look at her. Without another sound, she made her way off, away from guildhall.

"Come in. They are waiting."

"…Yes," I replied. He did not glance back. I followed him.

Two long tables had been placed in the center of the room, people seated in chairs on either sides. Everyone looked up when we came into view.

"Go," Ice told me.

I went to the empty seat next to Jukuna, which I felt was left empty for me.

"This is Rusalka," Jukuna introduced me once I sat down, "the newest addition to our guild."

I received long, observant stares.

"So, Jukuna, is she really your relative?" the man I recognized as Sky, Charisma's man, questioned with a half-smirk tugging on the corner of his lips.

"No."

I looked to Jukuna. His eyes were on Sweet when he spoke these next words."It was to allow her to settle in easier." He patted my arm on the table with his hand as he glanced over to my side. "She is…lady mine."

Stunned silence. I daresay every single one of them I looked to wore the same frozen expression.

"About time you've finally moved forward, isn't it?" Charisma's comment brought a momentary deep hush over the two long tables. I do not think she would've said that if not for the drink in her hand. As I mentioned, I had served drinks before to guests back at the Green Deviruchi. I knew who was drunk when I see it.

Sky, who had always been the resilient one in such a situation, laughed away the tension and remarked, "Right, because Charisma belongs to me." He attempted to wrap an arm around her shoulders affectionately, but got halted when she looked at him blankly with unseeing eyes.

"You've had a little too much…" I heard him tell her quietly. "Do you want to-"

"I'm fine," Charisma interrupted, rubbing her temples. Sky didn't protest.

Queen cleared her throat, successfully drawing the attention away from those two. "Now that every representative from two out of three factions is here…how about some introductions?" she declared.

Nods of agreement answered her. But one man, one of the new arrivals, hiked an eyebrow and asked, "Where's Lai? Did you see her when you were outside, Ice?"

"No," the assassin replied nonchalantly.

That's when Charisma set down her glass heavily on the table, causing a loud thud to sound.

"…No one can take his place…" she said in a soft, venomous voice.

"Charisma…" Sky went after her when she got up quietly and left.

No one else moved.

"You four must be weary from your trip," Jukuna said at last, calmly, his expression perfectly neutral. "We'll continue another time, when the others have arrived."

There were murmurs of agreement. Some got up and bid everyone a muted goodnight, while others lingered to have a word with our guild master.

Queen nudged my arm with her elbow as she passed. She was winking and grinning uncontrollably at me. 'Come with me,' she mouthed. I tossed a glance beside me. Jukuna was already conversing in low tones with one of the newcomers. I also looked around for Ice, but he was already out of sight.

"I knew it. I was one of the few who believed you're not actually his sister, but something else," Queen told me excitedly once we were outside by ourselves. "What Charisma said was true; it's about time Jukuna let go of the past…though she wouldn't have voiced that out loud if she were not drunk."

The red-eyed woman quieted down when I did not return the enthusiasm. "Charisma and Lai…"

"Ah…those two…so you noticed," Queen said to me, all at once drawing upon an air of anxiousness. "Charisma…she still believes that Lai is the cause for his death…the death of a guild member before you came."

A solemn moment elapsed. Queen let out a small sigh and sat down on the marble banister next to her. She spoke.

"Charisma is self-centered person, and an uncommitted lover, but there was one man whom she was deeply devoted to; one person who she'd live and die for…. Her brother, Carnelian," she said.

"He was a bright and considerate man, younger than her and wiser in ways of battle. He captured the attention of many fair maiden, of course. He was the reason Lai aspired to become one of us, you see."

Queen sighed. "Charisma opposed from the beginning. Lai was inexperienced. But her brother defended Lai because…I believe there was something between them. But…" She paused briefly before continuing. "One time Carnelian took Lai on a hunt by themselves, and were apparently on their way back when they were ambushed by enemies, unclear of which guild. Well…for some reason Lai was left alive, fueling Charisma's suspicion. Because it was a planned ambush, Rusalka," Queen told me.

…

One of us…which one? Who was the spy?

…

"Lai…" Queen said, "She's been trying the hardest. Sometimes I go to watch her and the progress she makes chills me. Her heart is set on becoming as good as Carnelian was."

I remembered her serious tone. The cold mask of determination on her face.

"Why?"

She arched a brow at me and answered, "Because you would do anything for the one you love."

She did not seem to be lying.

That, I believe, is when I first started to realize what Jukuna meant by what he said.

…

_'Do not fall in love.'_

* * *

-

"Ice."

He said nothing, silently coming up beside me on the terrace. We both watched the figure training alone down at the fields. I did not know what Lai was doing with her bow. Dark had long settled in, and she did not appear to be firing any arrows.

…

"Can she win?"

"Undoubtedly," his soft reply in the gentle breeze from the sea. "She has a reason worth fighting for, and she knows it."

I hesitated before asking him, "…Can Sweet win?"

It took him longer to answer. But what I sensed was not hesitation, no.

"Yes."

He knew of Sweet's feelings towards him.

I looked back to the field below us. I could hear the whoosh of Lai's bow in the silent night.

"…And I…" I inquired. What about me?

"Jukuna…" Ice's nonchalant voice explained to me, "…will never love you the way he acts in front of others."

I felt his gaze on me in the dark as he told me quietly, "He no longer has a heart."

I remember what I felt at those words. I still don't quite know how to describe it. Sadness, maybe. Perhaps pity.

I was not jealous.

"I may not be skilled…nor do I know about this thing called 'love'. But I must make it," I decided, and I told him that.

_'…There is a spy amongst us…' _Those words resounded in my mind.

"Because the only one Jukuna can trust…is me."

I could hear the ghostly smile when he reminded me simply,

"Two days left, Rusalka."

Two days to prove to him that I have potential to become an assassin, the title of something I did not even understand. I did not respond.

"…You can give up if you're afraid," Ice's soft, arrogant voice added a moment later. And I did not understand.

"What am I afraid of…?" I asked him.

…

"…Do you believe in folktales, Rusalka?"

If I didn't believe there was some truth in them, I wouldn't have spent the whole day seeking our storytellers back at the circus, now would I?

"…He will come for you soon, Ghost."


	12. Scene I

I've already promised you I won't let her take me away until I've told you all you need to hear.

She owes me that much.

Most of what I tell you, you already know. Because you, you too, are one of the actors in this play. …But it is better that I do not mention who you are... It will be…easier for me…

I will…I will begin…

Majesty...

* * *

**Scene: I**

* * *

-

"Jukuna," I greeted him at the front porch. I did not expect to see him there, the early next morning. He turned his head slowly and acknowledged me with a nod.

Still no word of Art or Siren.

"You have somewhere to be this morning?" he asked me absently.

"Yes."

"You should not be outside alone, Rusalka."

I lowered my head and replied, "I must complete my task alone."

His grey-green eyes turned and bore down at me. "I see." With another nod of his head, he left me by myself.

But I was not such a fool to believe that I could manage it on my own.

Ice never did say that I couldn't use outside help.

* * *

-

"Ghost."

"Old grandpa," I greeted back.

"I'm afraid you came at a bad time, my child. I'm expecting a guest," he told me, taking a puff from his pipe.

"I'm sorry. I will leave."

The corners of his dark eyes crinkled as he smiled. "No, it'll be alright. Since it's you."

I went and sat next to him, like he indicated.

"I joined the Green Deviruchi after I left the organization, to hide myself. But I know too much, they will not let me pass. That is why I quit secretly when the first rumor of me being an ex-assassin started to go around."

"Grandpa."

"Have I not taught you much, Ghost?" He turned to me with a warm smile. "You already have all my connections. Have I not taught you how to do the rest by yourself?"

"I have not forgotten what you have taught me, Grandpa."

He chuckled in amusement. "Really, now. You were followed here. Haven't I taught you better?"

I stood up. I was surprised at what he informed me.

"Not now, my child. Our guest has arrived."

He picked up the sword he had laid down next to him. The sound of metal clashing. A silver throwing knife fell against the ground.

"Glad to see you alive and well, Grandpa," a woman's voice sounded. The flapping of a cape. The woman dropped down from her hiding place, landing gracefully before us.

"I am Poison Cage," the red-lipped woman introduced herself, "Your once-disciple. You remember me as Patricia." She smiled a lovely, chilling, fake smile. "I'm glad to see you alive and well, Grandpa."

Her straight, black hair fluttered in the air as she turned around in a full circle. "To think that you've been living in a slum like this just to avoid your pursuers…You've really downgraded yourself, Grandpa."

"I have no use for extravagance. I just had to put up with it when I was with the organization."

She drew her sword slowly, the sound lingering in the distance between us. "No one is allowed to leave once they join. There is no exception to that rule, old Grandpa."

She only got a smile in return. I saw her struggling to upkeep her indifferent façade.

"You hated it that much that you would give away your life? That you would even leave me without a word?" She raised her sword, pointing the tip at him. "Look at me now. I've become strong anyway. I've become a high ranked assassin on my own, Grandpa."

"You're still far too young to defeat me, child," the old man declared.

"Lying old man," she snarled with her red, red lips. "I know about your illness. The reason your whereabouts leaked out was because you had to visit a medic in your condition." Again with the sweet, poisonous and fake smile. "What will you do, now? There's no one who can help you."

"…I can."

She had not even looked my way till then. I was no more to her than a stone next to her feet.

"Who is this?"

I looked over to him. He hesitated when he saw what I plan to do. But then he closed his eyes, smiled and gave me a nod.

"I'm his apprentice," I told her.

The woman was taken aback by that statement. Her sinister blue eyes narrowed at Grandpa. "You said you'll never leave me. But what's more, _this _is my replacement…? Hmph." Her sword rang as she swung it, bringing it up horizontal to her eyes. "Very well. Let's see who's better."

"You had potential, yes." He drew reflectively on his pipe. "Unlike anyone else's I've seen. Your potential far suppresses that of your father's and your mother's. But your bloodthirstiness had made you blind to the rules. Even we sinners have our own code."

"I've never broken the rule," she hissed, her features twisted by the snarl.

"The only reason you've never been caught breaking the rules, is because you kill all the witnesses. No, not only the witnesses. Anyone who you happen to see on your massacres." Grandpa put down his pipe decisively and looked at her directly. "Patricia…you are ill."

For a long moment the woman stood perfectly still. Then she laughed; a broken, hysterical laugh. "…Why?… Ill! You are ill!" More laughter. "You…you were the only one who said I'm not-…" Her long black hair curtained her face as she bowed her head.

"I'm not…" She was shaking, gripping the hilt of her sword so hard that the weapon shook. "Give him back…" I heard her whisper. Her head rose. She was glaring directly at me.

"Give him back!"

"Here, child." He offered me his sword. I accepted it. "It will be alright," he assured me.

"Don't take him away…No…Don't kill him! I won't let you kill him!" she yelled, rushing at me at full speed. "I'll kill him myself!"

Our swords clashed. That was when I felt the difference. Blood flowed from my eyebrow when I pulled back.

'These swords…' I thought to myself.

She came at me again. I parried. A long red slash appeared on my forearm. That was what it was. The swords appeared still when immobile, but they were actually flexible. With the right assertion of power at the correct moment, the wielder could cause the blade to bend its way into the opponent even when the blow had been blocked.

We kept going. Her movements were fast, only allowing me time to defend myself against her blows.

"Hmph. I see you've taught her how to defend well against my style…the style you taught me. Were you looking forward to this day?"

She thrust her sword forward in a blur. I blocked the tip of her sword before it pierced my abdomen, but her throwing knife lodged in my shoulder. She had thrown it at the same instant she made the thrust.

"The poison should take effect soon," she told me sweetly. "It's too bad your level is still not up to mine."

I reached up and pulled the knife out. I knew what she meant by poison. My time was limited, and so far I had not managed to put one scratch on her. I pulled out my own dagger and dug into my wound. He had taught me how to do bloodletting before.

"Old grandpa."

I saw him nod in understanding with my peripheral vision. He reached to his side, unsheathed and tossed me his other sword. That meant he was left without a sword.

I sheathed the dagger and caught the sword.

"There's…something else he taught me," I said as I faced her again, raising both swords in ready position.

"No…" she breathed, her eyes widening. "No way..." The hysterical expression returned to her face as she took out more knives with her free hand. "Y-you couldn't have…"

I remained still as she charged at me. My eyes took in her movements. I kept myself utterly still as I was taught, and waited.

I remember my right arm shook with the impact of her sword. My left sword deflected her knives. She was quick enough to leap back, and then attacked me again.

She realized it was futile by the third round, no matter how much faster she was. I saw it in her eyes.

"To teach someone to counter your own technique…This isn't like you, Grandpa."

"I would've liked at least one person to pass it onto before I die," he replied. He sounded so peaceful then, as if he was watching the scene from somewhere else.

"Why is it not me…?"

I stared at the woman before me. She was different from before. Not a trace of her previous maniacal expression or her faked smile etched her face. She looked completely devoid of emotion.

I saw her grip tighten on her sword, and saw that her eyes were still locked on the old man.

"Grandpa-"

I saw her move. Our swords met only for an instant. I was thrown back by the force and lost my footing. The next thing I knew, she was standing over me.

"What a fool…leaving himself defenseless like that."

Her words. They haunt me still.

"What's wrong? Is the poison finally beginning to take effect? Or is this your first taste of true despair?" She lifted her sword, the blood soaked blade held my eyes. One of my swords had fallen behind where she was standing. The other one, she was standing on. My dagger could hardly defend myself against her technique, but I was out of options.

"…You disgust me."

She swung her sword down. Flashes of light flitted before my eyes. The loud sound of her sword splitting in two echoed in my ears.

"That is enough."

His hair shone like silver under the glare of the sun.

"A sword-breaker…?" the woman's lazy voice inquired. "To catch my blade as it was swinging like that… You are good. Who are you?"

"It doesn't matter. If you dare touch her again, now that your job is done, I will kill you."

She reached to pull out a long, waved dagger at her belt. She smiled. "I am Poison Cage. Whether you are good or not, you still have no right to threaten me as such."

"Killing Ice," he said softly. I could picture the dangerous flash in his eyes. "That is my name."

Her eyes were already wide to their full extent, yet that twisted smile wound its way into her face again. "Marvelous. Simply marvelous! Ah ha! Ahahahahaha!" She continued laughing as she drew a long, waved dagger from her belt. "I'm honored to meet the one known as the deadliest killer alive!"

"Wait any longer and the poison will kill you. But lose any more blood, you'll bleed to death."

She blinked in confusion, and then realization dawned on her. "H-how…When-!?" A spasm shook her entire body, forcing her to drop on one knee. She was panting when she stood back up. But then, she looked to me and smiled sweetly.

"Hah…So you won today, girl. I shall like to play again someday and return the favor. Ta!" She whirled around, splattering more drops of blood onto the ground. If it were just any normal person, she wouldn't even be standing upright. But she, with one powerful leap into the air, disappeared out of sight.

"You're fortunate this was only a paralyzing poison," Ice told me, dropping the knife he was examining back to the ground. He stepped past me as he headed for the gate. "Go home."

* * *

-

"I need to speak with Render."

The immediate reaction was the hush which fell throughout the tavern.

"W-who, Miss?"

"I know he is here."

"Ghost."

It was the one I was seeking. The scar which ran down the right side of his face proved as such.

"Long time no see."

-

"The old man is dead," was the first thing I said to him.

Render made no big deal out of it. He tipped back in his seat and asked, "Really? Who got him?"

"A woman who calls herself Poison Cage."

"Her. Wasn't she the first among his so-called 'children'?" He took out the cigar from his mouth and dropped it into the ashtray. "You were there, weren't you, sis? He only trusted you, the last, with his whereabouts."

He blew away the smoke which drifted between us.

"No tears for the one who raised you, Ghost?"

"He didn't raise me," I replied.

"You're right." Render leaned back. "He didn't raise any of us. But the old man had a habit of taking in…weird ones," he said, running a hand through his hair as he studied me, "and teaching all of them his technique – 'Serpent'."

"He was hoping for us to take out one another until only one remains, I suppose. Like a pit of snakes. But a snake doesn't strike unless agitated. That is what each and every one of us failed to learn from him. Heh, except for you."

"This scar, which almost took out my eye" he said, pointing to the mark on his face, "was from one of his many 'children'. I've fought with a few of them before learning to quiet down my actions, so they wouldn't be able to find me and cause me trouble that easily."

"But, back at the circus, when he first took you in. I had already been with him for some time." He placed his elbows on the table and looked at me seriously.

"Do you remember the first time he had us cross swords, Ghost?"

I remember. The whole scene came back to me quite clearly. At the outskirts of the tents, with the night falling.

"I was stronger, faster, and I was skilled where you were just starting to learn. But I had a feeling, even until this day…that the strongest was there before me."

Me? I stared at his clasped hands and wondered if I had misunderstood.

"I'm only telling you this because you're probably blaming yourself for his death."

I met his eyes.

"That old bastard wouldn't have died unless he wanted to. Believe me, I've tried."

He shrugged off my surprised look with a simple, "The foolishness of youth."

"Now then… You didn't come all this way just to inform me that he's dead. What do you need from me?"

"There is an assassin I need to find out more about."

"Go on," he told me, lighting another cigar. "Give me his name and I can find out everything you need to know. I suppose I owe the old man a favor."

"He is known as 'Killing Ice'."

Render's lidded eyes trailed to me. "Don't tell me you're going after that one, Ghost."

"You've heard of him…"

"Who hasn't heard of him?" he asked as a matter-of-factly. "The man who slew that tyrant, the archbishop, half his advisors and the Royal Guards in one setting was him, the one they nicknamed 'Killing Ice' for the grip of freezing fear he held them in."

"Him…?"

"Whatever it is, you can forget it, sis. I wouldn't go within a hundred yards of that man," he warned me. He tapped his temple with a finger in demonstration.

"He's not in his right mind."


	13. Scene II

* * *

**Scene II:**

* * *

- 

'_Do not take the king's guards lightly. Many of them had been heroes. Only someone bred for the sole purpose of killing could've pulled off what he did.'_

…

I was still pondering those words when Queen rushed out to greet me.

"Oh goodness! Ice told me to wait for you, but he didn't tell me you were hurt. Wait here; I'll go get things for your wounds!"

I touched her arm, effectively causing her to pause. "There's no need," I told her, "they're only scratches."

Her red eyes looked me up and down skeptically. "You can't say that! Judging by the blood and the condition your clothing is in, there's no way they're just s-"

The words died in her throat when I slipped off my cloak in one arm. I even brought my arms closer for her to see.

"You see? They're not as serious as you think."

She recovered from her speechlessness rather quickly. "Oh, then…I'll get a bath ready for you. If Jukuna sees you like this, there'll be hell to pay."

"Queen."

She turned back to me. "Yes? Did you need something else?"

"When did Ice return?"

"Hn? Oh… Just now."

* * *

- 

It wasn't that he meant to trap me, I don't think.

It was I who had been careless.

"…Still following me, Ice?"

"You know I was here."

"…That's right." I kept my back to him, if only out of modesty, as I proceeded to strip away the remainder of my bloody clothing. "I am not shy."

I heard a metallic _chink _as his armored boot took a step forward. "You fell against one of her knives when she knocked you down. Your back…"

I glanced at him over my shoulder. I reached over an arm and pulled my hair out of the way so he had a clearer view of my back. "…What is it?" I asked.

He didn't respond right away. And when he did, it was quite an unanticipated response.

"Who are you?"

The same question he once asked. This time it froze me. And because I couldn't formulate a reply, he answered it for me.

"You are the apprentice of none other than the once-great swordmaster who was ranked on top of Venomous, an organization of half-bred bounty hunters who possesses inhuman abilities needed to slay the greatest of foes."

Things I did not know, and did not matter to me. Until then.

I did not think he heard me properly the first time. I turned to face him and slowly repeated my question.

"…What is it about me that is inhuman to you?"

One of his dark eyebrows rose. "…What makes you think I was implying that you are?"

I had no answer.

"How many has it been?" he continued. "Ten? Twenty? Did you kill them with your own hands?"

"…Go away," I said, slowly and clearly, still facing him but not meeting his eyes.

Was I afraid then? Or was I perhaps angry? I, who never feared.

"Are you in there, Ice? I have a notice to pass on," someone called from outside the bathroom. It was Little Bird's voice, the monk I spoke of who liked to cultivate herbs in the garden.

The sound of approaching footsteps outside the door. Queen's voice was heard saying, "What are you doing here, trying to peek? Ice is not in there."

"W-what? But-…N-no-no... Have you heard?"

"Of course."

"Well…pass it on to Ice if you see him…" His voice faded out.

"Rusalka, I have your clothes," Queen called. "Can I come in?"

Ice bowed, backing away into the shadows where the candle light couldn't reach, until I couldn't feel his presence any longer.

"Yes," I answered.

The door opened, and the purple-haired figure entered. "These are some clothes Jukuna got you. He seems to like white, because there was only white." She let out a small giggle.

"Thank you."

She blushed in embarrassment. "I'm sorry, I didn't mean to stare. Do you need help with anything?"

"No, thank you."

"Alright. I'll leave them here." She set down the pile of white clothes on a nearby stool. "Pull on this rope if you need me, it connects to a bell downstairs."

"Do you ever...fear?" I had asked quietly while she was making her leave. She heard me.

"I guess you found out…" Her red eyes met mine, and I saw all I needed to know through her eyes. "But we don't mention that around here."

* * *

- 

…

I guess it was around that time it came to me, that everyone in our guild…everyone-…whether it was Jukuna, our imperturbable leader, or someone like Lai and Queen whom I would have considered my friend, and even to the ones who had nothing they wished to hide such as our Art and Ice…

Everyone wore a mask. Everyone put on an act.

It suited me just fine. I became one of them long before they knew me…

Majesty…

…

* * *

- 

"My lord", those words caught in my throat. He had long before requested that I address him by Jukuna. In my moment of confusion I had forgotten.

Not even I have perfect memory, after all. Despite what they told me.

"How are you feeling?" He sat down next to me, at the edge of my bed. I did not remember how I got there.

"You gave Queen quite a scare," he told me. "She found you submerged in the tub of red water when you didn't answer her when she checked on you."

"I…" I remembered my eyes shutting on their own accord while in the water. "I must have fallen asleep…I'm sorry…"

"You should take better care of yourself. You could have drowned."

The room was silent. Normally he couldn't be found at the guildhall at that hour. It was my fault; I had troubled him.

"How…?" He wasn't even looking at me. He never looked at me unless he had reason to. Nevertheless I felt the weight of his words as he asked, "How did you get these cuts? He was supposed to watch over you."

"It was…it was my doing."

The question hung between us. I spoke up. I could never be anything to Jukuna except honest and true.

"I went back to that man…my first master."

-

…

If I had known... If only I had known…

Who would have thought that would be the first step to end it all…?

It was my doing…

…

* * *

- 

'_You came as one of us…and to us you shall return… Where have you gone to, without telling me, Ghost?'_

That same dream. Which I forgot to mention. Night and night I dreamt, under the moon's silver light. The same ghastly silver figures misted and blurred beyond recognition. But I knew them, did I not? They were my kin. They were my blood.

'_Ghost…Ghost… The master is waiting…at least answer will you?'_

I take that back… I-…I do not actually dream. I have never known the deep oblivious slumber aside from the periods of nothingness which receives me when I have exhausted myself.

Through my half-lidded eyes I see their spectral forms against the bedroom dipped in the color of night.

I form the words with my slack and unfeeling lips.

'Who are you…?'

He steps forward. He, center and front of all the rest. He was the leader.

'_Surely you remember _me_, at least.'_

I observed him. All at once my eyes were only for him. He wore a thin, long and shimmering cloak, but his features were pale and translucent like the rest of him and the others. If only I could see better. I squinted my eyes but it did not help. I could not focus on his face despite the clarity of the rest of the room and its furnishings.

Was this how dreams are like…?

'_I promised I'll watch over you…' _His faint, silky voice flowed over me like the ripples of night breeze that was coming in from the open windows. There was something about him. Something about his face, which I can barely see, his voice which I can barely hear. His hand which he held out to me.

'…_I'll let no one else protect you, Ghost.'_

I felt my eyes widen slightly.

'You…?'

* * *

- 

Last day for the task Ice had given me. I rose with one purpose in mind, though I wasn't sure what it was.

I needed to find Ice.

…

He wasn't anywhere I went to search for him. Perhaps he already knew that I meant to tell him that I resign.

I went back to stand outside his cabin in the backyard. I do not understand why, but I stood there, staring, for the longest time. If I had walked away, I would never catch a glimpse of his soul and of his world. I would have never known how great a threat he was to us…

And things may not have come down to this…

Maybe I knew all that…but still…

I had turned the handle on the door, and entered.

-

I remembered the box…the wooden box he claimed to store the reason he was damned for life. Do you remember?

It wasn't on my mind when I got there. But it was there on the table, posing a magnetic aura of its own.

My eyes wandered down to the bangle I haven't taken off from my wrist. The one he gave me. Was I going attempt again, after failing to pick the lock all the other times?

Yes.

Yes… I don't know what compelled me. There were instances when I felt as if I were in a trance, watching my own body move on its own.

I slid the bangle apart, drawing out the teeth of the lock-picks, and reached for the box.

* * *

- 

"Do you know who this is?"

He looked up from the piece of canvas.

"What have you gotten yourself into, Ghost? Running these kinds of errands."

"I cannot say."

He smirked to himself, revealing one sharp fang.

"Can you tell me anything, Render?"

"The woman's face, I do not recognize. By the quality of the paint and judging from her attire, she can only be of this time period, of the gentry or above," he informed me as one would explain details to a child. "But look here," Render pointed behind the figure of the seated woman.

"This had been cut out from a larger painting. The person standing behind her had been left out, but you can still see his arm. That insignia on his sleeve is of the House Millender, headed by the Duke of Lazreagues."

He was glancing at my face as he said this. I suppose he was watching for my reaction.

"What else can you tell me?"

He rubbed his chin thoughtfully and quirked a brow. "If my assumptions are correct, then this could either be the wife of Tynan, or it could be his daughter. The duke had a wife, daughter and son, all of whom were assassinated, or so the story goes. He sure had his enemies, being third in line to the throne. Next in line, now."

"What sort of enemies?" I found myself asking.

"Even you can put two and two together, Ghost."

That was true, but he answered me anyway.

"People who want to take control, themselves. And people who want to restore Tristan's lost son. This battle is far from being over, Ghost."

…

'…_-the Duke of Lazreagues desires that his son, the marquis, abandon his quest for revenge and to return home.'_

…

The black inked words scrawled across my mind's vision.

…Quest for revenge…

I rolled the piece of canvas back up.

"Leaving so soon?" Render inquired.

"Yes," I replied. I was halted from getting up to my feet. His hand held down my arm on the table.

"You see, Ghost. I still think you're extremely pretty."

I looked down at him questioningly.

"...Stay with me."

"Render…?" The presence of his followers behind me. They meant to block off my path.

"You and I, we came from the same past. That was why the old grandpa took us in. Have you still not figured out the reason _why_ he adopted so many like us?"

"…To have all of us kill each other off," I replied slowly. "…Is that not what you said?"

His veiled gaze fixed on my eyes intently. I did not know what he wanted, but I knew I wasn't in the best of situations.

"Do you know why he did such a thing? I'll tell you." He motioned for me to sit back down. I complied after some hesitation.

"He sought to destroy the organization. He sought to destroy the patron guild of the organization for using it and turning against it in the end. And how did he propose to do that? By turning his apprentices against each other until they wipe each other out, or until only one remain. A true monster who he hoped could take out the head of the patron guild."

He reached out, entwined his fingers in my hair. "You will not be safe out there, Ghost. Stay and fight at my side."

Render had always been stronger than me. A lot more experienced. I did not know if that had changed in the time we had been apart. I stared at his pastel blue hair, his vermillion shaded eyes. He had one hand over mine on the table and it didn't seem like he was going to let me go.

"What do you want from me?" I had asked.

"You are a quick adapter. You pick things up on the spot. You remember details perfectly. You are calm and collected facing anything. You have an air about you that could melt down any man's guard." With his other hand, he lifted my chin up.

"And you feel neither pity, fear, or pain." He whispered the words. Then he added, more clearly, "You are the perfect assassin."

His men were surrounding us, though they tried not to make it obvious. He was still holding down my one arm. I didn't know if I could draw my blade from under my cloak faster than them. I did not wish to come to blows with him, whom I have always considered a brother.

"Do you plan to carry out grandpa's wishes, then?" I questioned.

"No, no, no," Render shook his head in amusement. "The old man was _mad_, Ghost. Either way, that particular task is not for us."

I looked at him with my unasked question.

"Heh. I suppose I forgot to mention about that patron guild. It's led by a cold and unfeeling leader who handpicks his members and allows no outsiders into its ranks. But to be picked, you have to be freakin' crazy."

I judged by the way he gestured with his hands and his eyes that he meant 'crazy' in the literal sense.

"It's no wonder the members don't get along. They'd kill each other the first chance they get. They hide that same desire behind their masks. A shattered guild, if not for the leader."

…

You don't wonder why that sounded familiar to me, do you?

He was getting a little worked up with his hand gestures. He seemed to realize this when he caught me staring. A smirk formed on his lips.

"I should know. You see, I was with them at one point, at the old man's wishes. But I couldn't even get close to the target. The High Wizard, Sethron."

Sethron. That name-…That man was…

"The leader of Majesta."


	14. Scene III

A/N: Three things…

Yes, it seems like this will be one long, long story. Until after the intermission, I suspect.

Yes, you may have to re-read everything since I haven't updated in so long .'

Yes, it has been changed to Teen rating. I'd like to keep it at this level, but may still easily change.

Now…-goes back to playing dead-

* * *

**Scene III:**

* * *

-

His eyes changed color again. Despite observing him for however long, I could never find a pattern behind the changes. They simply turned whenever he switched from one serious matter to the next. Render was always on the serious side.

It was his other side that people needed to watch out for.

…

At that moment, his were a muted amber color. Inside his irises were waves and flames moving in silent, slow circular motions. I've never seen eyes such as those before him.

It would take me a long time to distinguish between what is, and what is not human.

"You're my dear, precious sister. Naturally, I'll protect you," he said, in that strange, hypnotic voice. I turned, and I looked away, but the glow of his eyes burned into my senses.

'…_I'll let no one else protect you, Ghost.'_

"Wait…"

Render let out a half-sigh, half-laugh as he looked at me. Then he stood up, starting a slow pace around our table.

"You see, Ghost. I am not a…prudent man. I have never acted on any reasons besides my own selfishness. When there is something I desire…I'll sacrifice a few lives to gain possession of it…" He completed a full cycle and drooped over her shoulder and whispered, "That is why…what _that boy_ had to offer appealed to me."

It was abrupt. I found myself pinned painfully against the table beneath him in midst of the sound of shattering glasses. He was only using one hand, but I knew that he knew where to press on my throat to cut off my air.

"So what will you do, Ghost?" Render leaned down and whispered into my ear. "Will you go against your 'brother' for a master who will sacrifice you without remorse?"

His words sank into me.

"Render…you…"

"Did you think that, with all my power, I wouldn't be able to find out who your current 'master' is?" he questioned me mockingly.

"I know that you are sworn to serve each master until the end…" Render added. "…So shall I sever those bonds for you, Ghost?" he asked me with a malicious smile. The razor edge of a dagger trailed a cut under my neck.

His irises now held a red hue which was the color of blood. I could not, for some reason, take my eyes off them and was unaware of what was happening until he lurched back.

Then I felt it…that feeling… That eerie and chilly sensation.

"Heh," Render scoffed amidst the sound of scraping wood and footfalls. Blood trickled down from his wrist and neck. I saw that two bloodied, long silver throwing knives were embedded into the wall.

"It must be hard on you," he commented nonchalantly as he watched his men chase outside for the offender, "…if they are watching your every move." Then he smiled and made a gesture which I interpreted as being I was free to go.

"I'll let you say your goodbyes."

-

I ran out into the sunlight, which gradually faded to uncover the fallen bodies of Render's men. Ice, alone, stood in the midst of an invisible circle where the splattering of fresh blood did not reach. His eyes, along with his attention however, were not directed at me.

Then…

"Was…it you, Ice? You, who threw those knives?" I asked.

Those intense blue eyes did not bestow their focus upon me.

"No. That was not I."

Then…my suspicions were true.

My time…was running out…

* * *

-

"Your time is up."

…

Ice handed me a bottle of wine. "It's safe. Drink."

My hesitation was only for a second. I complied.

He frowned as he leaned back against the table behind him, upsetting its four ancient legs as it groaned.

"So you're planning to drink until you're drunk?"

I removed the bottle, noting that it was nearing completion. "You didn't tell me to stop."

He gave me one of his rare, small laughs, behind his facemask.

"You amuse me, Rusalka," Ice admitted lightly, dangerously. I knew that I was not in the best of circumstances then. "…To think that you are directly connected to one of Sethron's higher henchmen."

The fact that I and Render were not on the same paths, did not matter. That was not what he was asking after.

"And you…?" I asked, directing my gaze at his right shoulder. "Even if you are not intending to betray this guild, we are in the same boat, are we not?"

I do remember if it were me who moved closer to him, or if it were the table he was leaning on that came closer. But somehow I was before him, sliding his facemask off as I said, "Marquis of Lazreagues."

The faint light of dusk spilt off his dark and dense eyelashes, reflecting in the blue depths of his eyes. Those eyes were not fixated on me then. They drooped, staring at a point past my elbows. A small, predatory smirk curled up a corner of his lips.

"I'll give you three guesses." He said so while holding up three fingers with his arms crossed before him.

"Given what you now know, let's see you give me a reason on how it would make a man…a traitor."

Was that admittance? His face told me nothing. His eyes did not glance my way.

"You had a mother and a sister who were assassinated," I said.

He did not reply. However, he checked off one of his fingers that were raised.

"Was the one who killed them someone of this guild?" I asked.

Again, he checked off a finger. Did that mean I guessed correctly or wrongly?

Nonetheless I…was never good at figuring out how these relations work.

"Did…you come to this guild for revenge?"

Black, his eyelashes were. Not even a blink for the infinitesimal I.

I was simply no more threat to him than a star in the sky, and him the inextinguishable night.

Ice withdrew his hand, and when he did speak he grasped me in his dark blue gaze.

"That much…is true; is all true."

-

…

Fear, you say?

No.

Perhaps I already had a reason for that.

I'll get to it soon…

And he…

Should even one drop of fear existed for me in his blood… I…

This aloof and fearless man… I…

We all feel safest with those who resemble us the most…

Majesty…

Am I not right…?

…

-

* * *

-

No, to say that Ice feared no one…that may be exaggeration.

There were four among our guild's own ranks who Ice, at the very least, was wary of:

Jukuna, our leader and my master, the war hero from Payon during the war now known as the Second Ragnarok, that goes without say.

Karma, the co-leader and Jukuna's most trusted man, can be none other than the best in power, honor, and intelligence.

Later on I learned that Art, too, was one whom Ice would not rather challenge.

And one more…

Although I admit that most of the elites were on par with one another…this man…

I met that man on that day…

-

"Oh, Changeling? Do you know her?" the man accompanying him asked, giving me a smile in greeting.

…

The man he named as Changeling did not reply. He drifted across the courtyard to me, so light were his steps, and he took my chin in his gloved hands.

"Uhh…" the man who was with him tried to interrupt.

I didn't know what the man who held me captive meant to do. His lips were almost touching my own when Sweet's voice cut between us like a knife.

"You'll be at the bottom of the ocean with chains wrapped around your feet by tomorrow morning if Jukuna sees you like this."

The strawberry blonde nodded in acknowledgement to the other man. "Herald. Your faction is the last to arrive this time. Where are the candidates?"

"Ah…" Herald shrugged his shoulders, causing locks of his stiff, teal hair arched off his shoulder blades. "Those two have never been to Comodo before. I set them loose to explore."

Sweet blinked once, and continued in her monotonous tone of voice, "So all newbies this year."

Herald smirked and nodded at the same time. "Just because they're new as contestants, doesn't mean they haven't been with us for a while. Besides," he tilted his wide-brimmed hat down. "You already know the weaknesses of the previous ones."

"Is that gloat I hear?" Sweet asked disinterestedly. "You'll be surprised if you think I've remained at the same level as last year." She paused. "You had better let go of her, Changeling."

Words which I couldn't utter out myself.

One, then the other, he withdrew his hands. The surge of power which I felt from his fingers lingered on the skin beneath my shirt. It was quite different from the mingling warmth which I had felt from Art.

It was something much, much more.

"Jukuna?" Changeling turned his blank and unseeing eyes to the female assassin in askance.

"Sweet," he said, going on, "you know as well as I that Jukuna only ever loved one woman…"

…

That's alright. That much I already knew.

* * *

-

"Laiiiii!"

The brown-haired huntress, alert as always, prevented his advancement by blocking his face with one raised foot.

His partner grabbed the blonde by the collar of his shirt and dragged him back in line.

"Now then," Jukuna's magnetic voice blended into the evening's chime. "Since everyone has arrived, let us begin introductions."

At once, each and every one of them were on their most formal bearing.

King, the lithe blonde who had been asking after Lai ever since they've arrived a few days ago, battlesmith and an elite of Alberta.

Laude, also elite of Alberta, who bowed with all the humbleness and grace of a performer, a minstrel with dark green hair which draped down to his waist.

They were escorting their two candidates from Alberta's faction; Hinalle with the long wavy pink hair and soft brown eyes, a priestess, and the contrasting Janvier with hair of silver snow and steel blue eyes, also a priest.

Those two politely described each of the church they originated from and briefly stated their abilities.

"Those two sure look like something," I heard Charisma comment to Sky.

"The priests?" Sky hiked an eyebrow in askance.

"No," she hissed back, "from the other faction."

"What's this?" Herald noticed and taunted harmlessly, "Only one candidate from the Payon faction?"

"We need no such insurance;" Charisma challenged, "our Wayinka will undoubtedly pass." She placed a hand on the hunter Wayinka's shoulder. "I, Charisma, and Sky, elites of Payon, have taught him all the skills of our craft. Let this be mental preparation for your defeat!"

"Fuh," Herald scoffed with folded arms. "Be as it may, but not this year."

The two candidates, who Herald and Changeling, elites of Prontera escorted, were the ones who worried them the most.

Lordy, the monk, and Scarling, the swordswoman, both stood at attention, a step further back than the others who were in line. Throughout all this their expressions had remained stoic and politely distant. They gave the very impression of being professionals at what they do.

Jukuna gave a nod. Everyone's attention turned to him.

"I trust all of you have been informed at some point, this year we have lost an elite among our ranks." He gestured for everyone to have a seat if they wished, and all of them remained standing.

"Because I have always paired up elites according to how well they could perform together, it is a concern to me that we now stand at an odd number."

"So you're saying…" Charisma prodded along.

A draft entered the dining hall right then. Changeling flicked one arm, and without warning, discharged three bolts of light which morphed into flickering wads of flame which danced around their target.

Hinalle and Janvier, the two priest candidates from Alberta, reacted to the bold gesture with blank-faced shock. But not as shocked as they looked when the circulating flames illuminated the figures who stood in their midst.

"That is… Father Lathan!?" Janvier asked in a mixture of disbelief and awe.

A long, ornate overcoat in shades of white, black and gold. His hair, drastically shorter on one side, scratching upon the oversized bandage covering down from his left eyebrow all the way until being blocked from view by his shirt.

"That…is a familiar name," the man said so himself, in the same flowing and warmth-filled voice. His good eye, livid blue, glanced down at each one of us in greeting as he smiled. "Here, I am simply known as Art."

The reason for the stunned ambience in the room, I was to learn, was not because of the fact that he was alive.

Pulling the lower part of his long overcoat out of the way, Art went down to a one-knee kneeling position before me.

"I have returned, as promised; once again a high priest of the Holy Order."


	15. Progression

**

* * *

**

**Progression**

**

* * *

-**

"Looks like everything is in place. It will be soon."

"Yes."

"Are you ready?"

"Yes."

Jukuna placed a hand on my shoulder. "You will know what it is that I want you to do, when the time has come. Do not worry about anything else."

…Still…

I would have liked to stay by his side, even for a little longer.

But my destiny had never been my own.

And neither had been my own life.

* * *

- 

"Art, you're…alive…" I had said this, earlier that evening inside the dining hall.

That caused varying expressions of incredulousness to appear on the visiting members of other factions.

"Oy? Something happened?" King rubbed the back of his neck, looking to our leader, Jukuna. Jukuna's grey-green eyes slid over to him inquisitively in return.

"Er…" The blonde man raised both hands in surrender. "Of course, it's of no significance to me. I will not pry into another faction's matters."

The atmosphere seemed to have lightened after that.

"Are you kidding?" Charisma chimed in. "Art is invincible."

Art himself gave a chuckle at her claim. He stood, explaining lightly, "My return had been delayed by my re-initiation into the Church. However…" With a pained countenance, Art stepped aside to reveal the other man behind him.

Siren, who was the bard that went with Art and Sweet on their quest, lowered himself to one knee before our guild master with drooping blue-violet eyes.

It was silent then.

"I understand," Jukuna responded quietly. He gave Art a nod. The high priest helped Siren to a stand and escorted him out of the hall.

"What is happening…?" I found myself asking Karma, who was next to me. He glanced down at me with his amethyst eyes for a long moment before looking over to Queen.

"I thought you informed everyone of the news."

Queen raised an eyebrow over at Little Bird accusingly.

"…Uhh…but I thought that…" the copper-haired monk spared a look at Ice, who gazed back at him steadily with lazy veiled eyes. "…That is to say…I forgot…"

"Everyone," Jukuna's voice rallied easily.

"It is a few days early. But I have decided. We will begin the exams tomorrow."

"You're serious?" Charisma asked, hands on hips, exchanging a glance with Sky.

"Good thing we came prepared," Herald commented, while Changeling let out an "Hmph."

"Ah well, it's better that there's no time given to spy on each other's skills, then," King added. Laude said nothing.

From the speckless, high plat-formed boots up to the matching long, drooping jester hat he wore, Laude looked every inch a high-end performer.

How nostalgic…

"Rusalka."

Jukuna was extending an arm out to me.

I took it.

"That woman…" it was Laude's voice which I heard as Jukuna led me away.

But as we went out into the open night, I couldn't hear anything more.

"My apologies for rushing you like this," my master's charismatic tone soothed over me.

"…I am the one who should be apologizing…"

He seemed genuinely surprised that I said that, although he did not allow for it to show well.

"I want to be of more help to you than I am now…"

Jukuna smiled lightly. Had there been more moonlight for me to ascertain, I could have said it was a regretful smile. "But there is something only you can do…"

We waited in silence next to the doorway he stopped before.

Soon after, Art emerged from within and blinked when he saw us.

Jukuna took the initiative. "Thank you for taking care of him."

Art crossed one arm over his chest in a half-bow. "It is my duty." He gave a nod when Jukuna told him, "I will have a word with Siren."

My raven-haired master paused and gave me a backward glance. "I will be counting on you with Rusalka."

"…I understand, my lord."

"And…" Jukuna trailed off expectantly.

Art smiled, though the two men had their backs facing each other.

"Everything…is going according to your plan, Jukuna."

* * *

- 

"Art…you're…?"

"Shh… Allow me, Rusalka," Art replied with his eyes closed. He said nothing else, kneeling before me inside of the gazebo with both my hands placed in his.

The silence allowed me to hear the sea-breeze drifting in from the west, as well as the warmth flowing onto my skin from his. That warmth was not accounted for by only his body heat.

A strange sensation was crowding me. Even if I tried to withdraw my hands, I wouldn't have been able to. The comfortable warmth radiating from him pulled at me. The way his voice melted into my blood weakened my will when he spoke.

Remaining otherwise still, Art asked, with his voice taking on a hypnotic timbre, "Strange…is it not working? Has Rusalka always been your name?"

"Ah…" I was going to take some time coming up with a way to answer to that.

"No… You went by another name in the Green Deviruchi, am I correct?" that man answered for me.

"Laude?" Art inquired, glancing over in surprise. "This isn't a good time-"

I snatched my hands back in response to the abrupt screen of black pouring over my vision.

"Rusalka?" "Laude-!" Fragments of Art's concerned voice filtered through. "-do not panic-…"

I couldn't hear the rest of his words.

…

_Rusalka? _

_That is not my name._

_Who gave me that other name?_

_Was it not the others from the circus?_

_Or did it carry over with me from before even that?_

"Was your name not Ghost?" Laude's voice intervened.

_I…_

_That is…_

'_Which Ghost?'_ Those thoughts._ 'From which time?'_

I remember seeing a momentary blank. And then…it rushed in…the sound of a hundred waves dying upon the sand.

"_you are my friend" "hearing this?"_

"_listen to me"_

"_not again"_

"_bottles this size" you_

"_my masterpiece" "there is a way" "today's lesson"_

"_with my blood"_

"_read this for me" are "my dream" "need to eat something"_

"_who has broken in?" "what shall be thy name?" "what is your offer?"_

"_I will protect her with my life"_

"_do you love him?"_

"_she will not die" "I will kill him"_

"_attempt number"_

"_I am the creator of Project Majesta"_

"_won't remember any-"_

_my "million zeny" _

"_for the plan"_

"_you won't disappoint me"_

"_don't forget"_

"_I'll hear your proposal"_

"_erase your"_

_ghost_

* * *

- 

That was how, when I regained full consciousness, Jukuna was with me back in our room.

"You need to be more careful, Rusalka."

I felt my forehead, trying to remember what had occurred up till that point. "…I…am to blame. Wholly to blame."

Jukuna placed his hand on my head. "I mean you need to take better care of yourself. I have told you that you are not like everyone else, have I not?"

"Yes."

He let out a small sigh and patted my hair. "So you passed out because Art tried to restore your memories… One would think that he would be skilled enough to guide it through."

His long hair swayed gently with the gust as he drew back the heavy curtains to our room. "Did you recall anything?"

The stars in their celestial thrones were in their full glory that night, the glittering like the fragmented sentences which prickled into my consciousness that evening.

"I…only heard some voices I do not recognize," I told him honestly.

"That is good…" he replied, his dark silhouette glancing downwards towards the inner courtyard. "…It would be troublesome if you remembered everything, now."

We were still.

"Did something happen between you and Ice?" Jukuna wondered out loud.

"He seemed quite angry at Art for the mishap."

Ice was?

"But remember, Rusalka…"

I got off my bed quietly to be able to face him in the dark.

"Do not believe in anyone. Not anyone."

Those words I was to live by.

"I will remember," I promised him. But…

"Why…don't you tell me anything?" I had asked.

Yes…

Who joins in…

Who leaves out…

Who is true and who is a traitor… I believe he knew these even then.

"Forgive me; it is not my place to say." I was only…concerned by what Ice had told me.

Jukuna took his time for a response this time.

"It is not that I do not trust you, Rusalka." When he spoke, his voice was firm and clear.

"Though you may not have noticed, you have very expressive eyes."

And I had never known.

"Some can use those eyes to lie and to cheat," Jukuna told me. He gave me a glance. "Can you?"

Because I did not know how to answer, he let out a small smile and ran his hand through my hair.

"Have you come to a decision, Rusalka?"

I knew he already knew the words I was going to use.

"I will participate in the contest. That is of course."

If Jukuna needed for me to rise up, then for him, I will rise to the top.

"Then I will tell you this much;" my master relented, glancing up at the sky with folded arms, "beware of the one who will try to get closest to you during the contest…"

Remember that once Ice had told me that Jukuna was a cold and calculating man. I supposed I understood what he meant, gazing upon that figure in the dark with eyes which seemed to be observing things which were not there.

"Looks like everything is in place. It will be soon."

* * *

- 

"Hey, I did say those were for you, but they're not for eating," Queen told me the next morning.

The purple-haired albino stifled a laugh at my clueless expression. "What? Don't tell me you've never received flowers before."

"They do look a little strange, don't they?" Queen went on, setting some diced fruits before me. "I don't think they're indigenous flowers. Goes to show how much they want you to forgive them."

"Who…?" I asked.

Queen leaned her elbows on the table. "Let's see…I think this one was from Laude. And this from Art. As an apology for what happened last night," she explained.

"Oh…"

She blinked her pink eyes at me. "You weren't the least upset? Such a sweet girl. Had a lot of young boys following you back in the Green Deviruchi, did you not?"

Queen then pursed her lips as if realizing that she said something out of place.

I supposed word got out about that. But I, at least, was not particularly affected by them knowing.

"Yes…" I say, "…at the beginning."

Looking slightly abashed, the woman started to return to busying herself with preparing everyone's breakfast, but she hesitated.

"Do you…want me to assist you, Rusalka?" Queen had asked, hands frozen in mid-motion in adjusting her apron.

"Assist me?"

I did not understand what she meant.

"You plan on becoming an Elite, do you not?"

"Her? She'll never get my vote."

Queen startled and turned to the door, then tsk'ed at Ice's cold demeanor.

"And why are _you_ here so early?" She wanted to know. "The others are all helping their apprentices get ready."

The platinum blonde man peered at Queen's turned back, and then turned his attention on me. "She_ is_ my apprentice."

"Oh?" Queen replied sarcastically, stacking more wood into the furnace.

"If you're done here, come with me," Ice told me.

"I don't need anymore preparation…" I told him while I was following him through the halls. But I was following nonetheless.

"You don't need anymore preparation?"

I had no doubt his cold voice was scoffing at me then.

"You, who can say that with the same nonchalance as with how you accepted everything I told you last evening;" Ice rounded back to face me, asking lightly, scathingly, "you think _you_ can compete?"

I suppose he interested me, by the way; someone who could scorn and despise as easily as I fail to grasp onto such emotions.

I lowered my eyes and replied, "You are not the spy, and neither does it matter."

He was about to speak, and I drew in a breath and followed up on my statement with:

"If you were a spy, rather than regarding the ones closest to Jukuna with suspicion, you would try to appear normal, would you not?"

"And while knowing full well that Jukuna looks into…everyone's…origins before recruiting, you suspected me of being a guild enemy."

"Thirdly, a fearless and cold blooded man would not have held back for five years doing nothing."

"And fourthly, if you say that lack of action is due to not being prepared, then wouldn't you be the, in the least, worried over what knowledge I now hold against you, Ice?"

Ice's reaction, I had already predicted. He let me step closer to his mocking blue eyes so that I was right next to him.

I asked him quietly, "Then what if I say…"

"Tell me who it is that killed your mother and sister, and I will help you with your revenge."

Yes, that was what I told him. And him?

His loose snowy hair, his sharp dark eyelashes, his long legs and armored arms. His whole body quivered.

I believe he was laughing.

The morning rays which managed to file through the gaps into the open halls brought an illusion of warmth into his smirking eyes which weren't on me.

"That is why I say…you are no match for the rest." Those were his solemn and arrogant words.

Ice turned, leaving me to follow.

"Help me with my revenge?" he asked in amusement. "You say that as if you've even killed single person in your life. I might as well tell you this now…"

We were approaching the front gates. He waited till I caught up beside him before reaching a hand up to draw down his facemask.

I suppose that signified something, although I did not know what.

"You asked if I came here for revenge; that is correct… You asked if the person responsible is of this guild; that, too, is correct… But the person who assassinated both the duchess of Lazreagues, my dear mother, and her daughter – my elder sister…is none other than I."

He bowed in an introductory gesture. "Killing Ice."


	16. First Interlude

**A/N:** I lost my character sheet. I haven't had time to reread my own story. I can't promise regular updates yet. This is a shorter chapter to bridge into second part of the first arc, another chapter will follow soon.

* * *

**First Interlude**

* * *

"_You asked if I came here for revenge; that is correct… You asked if the person responsible is of this guild; that, too, is correct… But the person who assassinated both the duchess of Lazreagues, my dear mother, and her daughter – my elder sister…is none other than I."_

I am quite sure those were his exact words.

"Your reaction…" Ice's voice trialed, his dark eyes narrowing with his frown "…is a bit lacking, Rusalka."

* * *

…

_Ah, but he couldn't have known. _

_I, who had never known the love of a mother or a sister, met his bold, inquisitive stare..._

…_and did not understand._

_Majesty._

…

* * *

"Then," I said carefully, "for what reason" and I lifted my head in response "is your vengeance?"

Even if I could not see it with my eyes, I knew that he gave me a dark smile to accompany the darkening of his eyes. "That is why I say you cannot."

…

Ah…that again. It was the same as back then, when he had told me that I undoubtedly did not have what it takes to become one of _them_.

But why?

He took a step towards me. I felt the cold, metallic edges of his arm armor when he lifted my chin up. "…Such beauty," he said softly, "does not suit the tainted ambitions of Jukuna."

Ice saw the narrowing of my eyes and withdrew his hand. "You…are you sure you want to know?"

"That letter was addressed to you, was it not?" I questioned. "Will you say you are not involved with the guild, Chimera?"

His deep blue eyes glittered coldly. "If one were to infiltrate into the High Court and to assassinate the king with all his royal courtiers, he would certainly have had Chimera's influence."

And Ice was the rumored phantom killer who had single-handedly done just that.

"To think that you can learn in a short amount of time what I was born and bred to do…" He stepped away, leaning back against the front gates of our guild's headquarters. "…This is not a _game_, Rusalka."

If he had said that because he had been worried for me, I could not have understood that. The only way I could have interpreted his words was either that he did not think me good enough…or that he did not want me to carry out Jukuna's plans.

The silent, enigmatic man before me waited for my response. He could have waited on forever, for time always seemed to slow for him alone.

"You do not think I will pass the exam…" I stated quietly.

"No," he put it bluntly, eyes narrowing, "I don't."

"The duke of Lazreagues, my father," Ice chose to enlighten me, "is a demon." He fiddled with a throwing knife with his fingers as he spoke.

"He raised me, his only son, as the devil's tool. At the age of seven my hands have already been dyed red by blood."

If there was one emotion I could have discerned from his voice and countenance, I would say that he seemed…nostalgic, of all things, while saying such things as that.

"To sever me from the remainder of my humanity, the man had me poison the cup of a noblewoman at a masquerade ball." Ice gave a small laugh. "The rumor that the duchess of Lazreagues died of a slow, ailing illness is a lie."

So that was what he had meant by…

'_What lies inside…?' _I had asked. The painting of the duchess of Lazreagues, that was…

'_The reason I am damned for life.'_

"I was fourteen years of age, then. Old enough to formulate my own choices despite the few options he gave me," Ice told me. "You are wondering why I continued to stay with that monster?"

"…He held the life of your sister in his hands…" I had guessed.

"Pfff…" he scoffed. "…You say that as if saw my sister more than twice a year since the age of ten." His white-blonde hair blew over his hardened eyes as a morning breeze swept in from the direction of the ocean.

"…It was not love for one of my own tainted bloodline which kept me there. Nor was it concern for her pitiful life, trapped in that hell. I…"

Ice's dark, dense lashes settled on his cheeks as he shut his eyes briefly. "…I simply could not have left her there by herself…with that monster."

"…Is…that why you killed her?"

It was a question, only. I tell you honestly that I was having trouble making sense of all he told me. But his discomposure had been easy for me to discern, even if it was over in an instant.

"No."

I met his unwavering stare.

His eyes glinted in cruel amusement. "It was a miscalculation on his part. For all his twisted ways of thinking, he still did not expect for her to take her own life…for her dear, unredeemable brother's sake."

His sister had killed herself, to set him free. That was what he seemed to be saying.

"…Heh," Ice scoffed in amusement. "Oh my, did you believe what I told you just now?"

I do not know. The thought had not crossed my mind until he had mentioned it.

"Didn't Jukuna tell you something along the lines of…do not trust anyone?" Ice remarked, raising one eyebrow ever so slightly.

That was true. I had not yet understood the relation between trusting and believing.

"…Do you want to be free?"

* * *

…

_Later, much later, someone had asked me that same question again…and perhaps with more meaning._

_But Ice had been the first. He was the first…_

…_who had challenged my very existence…._

_Majesty…_

…

* * *

…For I…exist for my master.

That and only.

…

"_He_ is looking for you, isn't he? The White Cloaked Death."

Ice held open the iron door of the front gate with one extended hand, despite its sheer weight. "If you desire to return to your kindred, _I _can make it look like an accident."

He looked to me with his serious, unblinking eyes. I wonder if he understood that why I said what I said…was not due to a lack of trust.

"You are kind, Ice. I see that, now." I did not shy away from the intensity of his gaze. "But, unlike you…serving my master…is the only existence I have," I said softly. "I absolutely…_cannot betray Jukuna_."

"You will not pass the exam," Ice stated after a long moment.

I answered, "I cannot fail."

"It looks like you lost the bet, Ice. She is no traitor."

It was Art's melodic voice which interrupted us. He was smiling fondly while holding a hand out to me. "Come, Rusalka. Everyone has gathered. It's starting."

"Heh." Ice leaned over and whispered next to my ear as he stepped past, "I will have you pay for that."


	17. Act II

**A/N:** As promised, here's an update. If you're wondering why I switched to using italics for Rusalka's present-day voice, it's because the site has disabled use for single hyphens as breakers -.-' it's disabling everything…

* * *

**Act II:**

* * *

The first part of the exam took place beneath a turbulent, dawning sky. It was the location Jukuna had selected, the highest cliff in Comodo which was facing another cliff directly, with the high wind blowing cold sea breeze from the long fall below.

Hinalle, the pink-haired priestess from Alberta's faction, looked to be especially pale.

"The first test a test of courage," Jukuna's magnetic voice traveled hauntingly despite the howling of the wind. "If you please, Sky, Charisma," he addressed the two elites.

"Aye, aye," the sultry-eyed huntress acknowledged. She and her partner Sky both positioned themselves in their selected spot before each drawing their respective heavy longbows. They were war bows, a combination of wood, steel, and metal filaments, and both taller than the height of Sky upright. The two masterful archers were able to draw them to full span before releasing their arrows.

Those two arrows flew an identical and parallel arch, each finding their mark on the opposite cliff and taking one end of the thick rope ladder with them.

"Ahhh," Charisma huffed, massaging her shoulder. "Man, first thing in the morning!"

Jukuna seemed to be satisfied with their effort. He turned back to face the rest of us.

"This test is simple. However, failure in the completion of it does not mean your eviction from the rest of the contest. I do not care if you run, crawl, jump or roll; only bring me one of the scarves tied to the midpoint of this ladder."

…

The silver-haired priest, Janvier, had to steady Hinalle as she swayed on her feet.

"Do you really have to make it sound like it's such a simple task?" Lai was muttering loud enough for him to hear.

"I trust none of you will face any difficulties," Jukuna added, as if reading their thoughts.

On that note, Charisma, with one hand, thrust forward her protégé, Wayinka, in front of Jukuna.

"Our Wayinka will volunteer to go first!" she declared. Sky shook his head helplessly, giving the uncomplaining hunter a pat on his back.

"Very well," Jukuna consigned. "Whenever you're ready, Changeling," he turned to say to the tall cloaked man clad in a splendid array of symbolic ornaments.

Changeling bowed to Jukuna. "Anytime you see fit; I am ready."

Dark-haired Wayinka was given the signal to go ahead.

He hesitated at the edge, staring straight down into the crevasse between the two cliffs.

"Not bad, not bad," King was commenting to Laude behind me, "looks like he's one to face his fears head-on."

"Hey-" I glanced back to see that King had turned his blonde head over to Karma, Jukuna's right-hand man who was on the other side of Laude. "Is this guy good?" he wanted to know, jabbing his thumb in the direction of Changeling. "Remember last time, we-"

King was silenced by Laude's clapping a hand over his mouth.

"Pray excuse us," the long-haired minstrel Laude apologized to everyone. Without offering an explanation, he dragged his partner away from the small gathering.

The candidates for the rank of Elite exchanged glances.

"Don't let it get to you," Karma told us. "All the elites have gone through something similar. Look…"

Wayinka was doing well. He was about halfway to the target before he slowed down. The ropes weren't perfectly tight, and with the strong wind he might have been experiencing difficulties with keeping his balance.

"Tsch." Charisma went to the very edge of the cliff. "Wayinka!" she called out. "Is this the extent of your determination!? Show me your desire to win!"

I saw Lai roll her eyes at Charisma's back from the corner of my eyes. She muttered to herself, "What the heck? She's only pressuring him more."

Whether or not it was the effect of Charisma's words, I do not know. Wayinka did, however, start to advance again.

"He made it," the teal-haired hunter Herald sighed out in relief. "That's what you call dexterity."

"No…" Karma could have been smiling behind his facemask. "Not just dexterity."

Charisma grabbed hold of Wayinka's arm the moment he returned to solid ground. She was the one who looked more relieved than anyone else.

"My, my… Not even one slipup," Jukuna noted, taking the scarf from Wayinka. "You sure have raised the standard for the others." He glanced at us. "Well?"

Lai met with Charisma's direct stare and accepted her silent message of challenge. "I will."

Laude had returned King to the group at that point. The battlesmith scampered over to Lai. "Don't worry, Lai, if you fall-"

"You'll what?" the brown-haired huntress asked sarcastically. "Die with me? _Please._" "

"She's cold…so _cold!_" King had whined to his partner Laude, who replied indifferently, "She's right, you know."

"Ugh!" Lai had made her first slip no further than five steps from the start, but she was able to put herself back on track without any problem.

"Oh, ain't she brave?" King asked Laude in admiration. "She'll pass this test."

"It's a test for courage, after all," Laude replied.

"That's enough," Jukuna called out to Lai. She had done bravely until it came to the point where she needed to reach down to untie the scarf. It looked like the huntress was frozen in her crouching position, however, and her arms were trembling visibly. "You don't have to go further. Changeling…"

Changeling gave a slow nod. He shook out one hand under his heavy, ornate sleeves and snapped his fingers before using the same hand to trace a single rune in the air. A gust of white wind appeared before him. The man pointed at Lai, sending the conjured wind over to the huntress. It encircled her and lifted her away, dispersing only after her feet touched land.

Perhaps that was what did it for the priestess Hinalle.

"My liege," Janvier called out to Jukuna. "Forgive my impertinence; I'm afraid Hinalle can't do it. She's always been terrified of heights."

"Yeah, that's true…" King, being one of the escorts for the Albertan candidates went over and apologized to the long, wavy pink-haired girl wrapped in Janvier's arms. "Sorry about this, we're never informed of what the plans are beforehand."

"No…don't treat me any special…" She was clutching the crucifix she wore around her neck when she pushed his arm gently aside. "I can still try… I-…I won't pass this exam if I can't even face my fears."

* * *

…

_I will not go on. _

_Sweet, the strawberry blonde assassin, and the one who had issued a challenge out to me prior to this…she was the only one out of all of them who had not faltered at all._

_But I…had been an acrobat before Jukuna took me in. _

_Height and the keeping of balance was no obstacle for me at all._

_Am I deserving of the title Karma gave me, for being 'truly fearless'? _

…

_No…_

_I eventually did fear, if it could be constituted as fear. _

_I first experienced it the moment the two members of the Crow revealed themselves to be traitors before the golden Emperium's pedestal, back in Majesta's tent where they reencountered me. _

_A heavy and numbing sensation. _

…

_Even though Jukuna had warned me…_

_To beware of the one who will try to get close to me during the contest…_

_Majesty… I had not guessed right._

…

* * *

"This second part of the exam is a test of endurance," my master Jukuna announced. His grey-blue eyes flicked over Little Bird's hunched form.

"Is there a problem, Little Bird?" he had asked the monk.

"I'm…not feeling so well," the metallic-copper haired monk replied with a grimace.

Karma's deep calm voice addressed Jukuna. "…Actually, Jukuna, you should look over there."

They had been staring at me. The two Pronteran candidates, that is. I had noticed this when I had looked over in the direction Karma was inclining his head towards.

Although the two looked to be in discomfort, each with an arm wrapped across their midsections, both Scarling and Lordy's steady gaze did not lift from me.

Janvier and Hinalle, too, seemed to be suffering, and it was more obvious on them.

Jukuna breathed a small sigh, turning his attention to Queen.

"Do you know something regarding this matter, Queen?" his low, mesmerizing voice drawled.

The female blacksmith answered by the way of a wry smile.

Charisma stepped forward, placing one hand on Wayinka's shoulder. "Heh. What's the matter? Candidates for the rank of Elite should be able to recognize poison when they see it, right?"

Wayinka blinked his dark eyes silently. He was perfectly fine.

Sweet, too, looked perfectly fine.

Little Bird was rolling melodramatically on the ground next to Charisma's feet.

"Why are you taking the tests, anyway?" she asked him, rolling her dark, passionate eyes. "You're not even taking the exam. But more importantly-…" Charisma looked incredulously over her shoulder to the person behind her. "Why is _that _idiot also like this?"

'That idiot' was referring to King, who, despite being an Elite and _not _being a candidate, was also showing a countenance of sufferance as he propped one arm on Laude's shoulder to support himself.

"Ugh…" King groaned, explaining, "Since Lai skipped breakfast this morning, Queen made me eat her share."

Lai pretended not to hear.

"I'll die…" King claimed while wincing, to which Laude only replied with, "Just die, idiot."

…

Laude was actually quite a brief and indifferent man when there was no need for him to take on his performance persona.

…

Teal-haired Herald stepped before his two protégées from the Prontera's faction. "So, theoretically speaking, we're the only ones at a disadvantage?" the hunter asked, raising one hand thoughtfully to his chin.

Janvier was passing his hand, a greenish-white glow emitting from it, across Hinalle's forehead. It was apparent by that point that he was the more experienced out of the two. Lifting the effects of the drug Queen had used did not even cause him to break a sweat.

"Interesting," Herald had remarked with a smirk. He snapped his fingers. "Show them what it takes to be made an Elite."

"Yes!" Lordy and Scarling had answered to his command simultaneously.

"Good." Jukuna smiled a knowing smile of approval. "Charisma, Sky, Herald, Karma," he named.

"Me, too?" Karma, inquired with one dark brow arched.

Jukuna tossed the olive-skinned assassin his spare bow and an arrow. He then notched his own arrow.

"You know how I hate longbows," Karma reminded him, but obliged nonetheless.

Jukuna, alongside with the three other hunters and Karma, released his arrow into the sky at the same time the others did, despite having to signal for them to shoot with one hand.

That was simply the speed of his drawing time.

"I lied; this is not a test for endurance. Again, you will not be disqualified, but only five of you can succeed in this part," the guild leader of the Crow turned to say to us.

"I hope you all were paying attention."

* * *

The candidates in the contest, there were ten total.

Queen, the blacksmith; Lai, the huntress; Sweet, the assassin; Little Bird, the monk; and myself; making five of them belonging to the main faction of Comodo.

Janvier, the priest, and Hinalle, the priestess; those were the two candidates from the faction of Alberta.

Scarling, the swordswoman, and Lordy, the monk; those two were candidates of the faction in Prontera.

Wayinka was the only candidate brought from Payon, a hunter.

It meant that one out of two will fail this part.

Except…

"Is he for real? We're supposed to remember where the darn things landed somewhere in this madness!?" Little Bird was making his complaint while staring into the unending stretch of undergrowth under the shades of palm trees from his lying position.

"…You're just pretending, aren't you?" Charisma asked tartly, stepping a heel on his ribs.

"OW! No! I can't believe Queen poisoned me! OW!"

Karma glanced over at me from the side, as the other candidates have made their way off.

"I had my doubts," he admitted to me, "but it seems like Ice did not do badly in training you."

Ah…

I did not fall victim to the poison.

I did not feel any different at all.

But I do not think that was the reason.

There was one thing which kept replaying in my head.

And that was the incident which occurred that morning, when Queen had turned in the making of breakfast to face me and had asked,

'_Do you…want me to assist you, Rusalka?'_


	18. Character Conflict I

**A/N:** As my greatest fan points out, 'why aren't there any transcendent jobs besides Art (and Laude), and why aren't there rogues and alchemists?' For _this particular story only_, I wish to avoid labeling of characters by game job names (for example, 'Assassin of the Cross' is based off a guild in ragnarok manga). The alchemist is another part, whose roles you'll be seeing later.

It will be useful to note that the 'Elites' in this story are the equivalent of what a transcendent class would be. It will become more obvious when I get to the part, soon, where you get to see them battle n.n

* * *

**Chapter 18**

**Character Conflict I:**

* * *

The first groan of a toppling palm tree was heard even before I set out.

"It's started," the sound of Charisma's voice behind me commented. "…I didn't think you'd pit them against each other so early on, Jukuna."

Jukuna, my master and the guild leader of the Crow, sounded to have let out an amused sigh.

"…It can't be helped. Those two are too attached to each other."

I think I understood what he meant, upon hearing that. Although I did not know which two he was referring to.

If only five of the ten candidates could succeed in this part of the exam, it meant that the partners would have to go separate ways.

It meant that each one of us will be racing against at least one other to be the first to retrieve an arrow.

I wondered if that was the reason why Jukuna had only allowed us to leave one by one.

Well, I should correct myself; Little Bird had exempted himself from the test at that point.

"Go on," Jukuna's voice urged me lightly, "but do not forget, Rusalka…"

* * *

How can I describe it…?

It was not that I had encountered him while I was going deeper into the wilderness.

He was simply just there.

"Are you the last one?"

Lordy, the pastel-green haired monk, with his shoulder-length layer of hair dangerously close to covering both eyes before being twisted into a knot at the left side of his head. It was the first time I heard him speak something aside from mentioning his name, or in response to an order.

He was alone, nestling down in the shades underneath the palms. His gold-lit eyes stared at me emotionlessly as he waited for an answer.

"There is no one after me," I replied.

Lordy rose up. His still gaze returned to me.

"I have no intention of competing with you," he said as if to reassure me. "Too bad, I thought I might be able to test out that 'Wayinka' beforehand."

…

I was not even viewed as a threat…but that was not in terms of winning the race, Majesty.

…

Out of the nine candidates who entered the tropical wilderness, only three had returned with an arrow.

Hinalle, Lordy, and I.

The reason for that, I was to realize, was not simply because the rest had lacked skills in tracking.

Scarling, the other candidate from Prontera with Lordy; she returned Wayinka's silent, sidelong glance with a smirk. She had returned shortly after he had.

Queen and Lai had returned together, but the two did not exchange looks.

Janvier and Sweet, too, returned roughly the same time. He seemed to be supporting one arm with the other, both shoulders rising and falling rapidly.

"…Well done," Jukuna said approvingly. "I'll see you all tomorrow."

* * *

Art was laying a blessing on the priest and priestess from Alberta's faction. There was a serene quality to the space surrounding the three of them which I did not wish to penetrate.

The high priest noticed me after all, excusing himself from the company of Hinalle and Janvier.

"Rusalka," he said with a charming smile, "I heard you did well."

* * *

…

_Me, beautiful?_

_No…_

_Art was beautiful. Remained that heartbreakingly beautiful._

_I had even begun to understand this on my own, not merely through others' words._

_But that understanding…only came at the very end…_

_I have…wronged him…Majesty…_

…

* * *

"This is…in apology for my incompetence the other night," Art told me, placing the cross in my palm. His long, gloved fingers closed my hand around the silver. "I hope you will forgive me."

…

Did you realize, Majesty?

The two to-be traitors of the guild…

…were not limited to the candidates only.

When had I realized it?

When I looked up into his eyes and felt the warm, comforting feeling he had always invoked inside me?

Art blinked slowly, a tinge of forlornness tainting his kind eyes.

"I was unable to be of help to you again, wasn't I?"

"Oi, dat's fo sore," Little Bird's mumbling, indistinct voice interjected. Art blinked, his soft brown lashes shone with a golden sheen with the setting sun.

Little Bird gulped down the mouthful of medicinal herbs he had been munching on. "Shouldn't there be a healer present aside from the candidates?"

The monk lifted one side of his sleeveless shirt to point at the imprint Charisma's sharp heels had made on his side. "Me, for instance; I got picked on for being poisoned into a vulnerable state, even though I forfeited."

At this point Art had blocked my view with one hand.

"Ah-er…sorry," Little Bird apologized quickly. "But, really. Why did Jukuna have _you _stay behind as well?"

I heard Art's languid exhale of breath.

"…Someone needs to keep an eye on _him_, at least."

* * *

Ice was not the only other member of the Crow who had stayed behind to keep watch on our headquarters.

There was the priest, Maven, if you still remember him, who seldom stepped away from his scribal duties inside the guild.

There was Eidolon, too, the swordsman I saw training on some occasions, who for reasons unknown to me had dropped out from the list of candidates before the contest began.

Among the rest, there are still many, but I need not mention them.

Siren, the bard, I have not heard from since Jukuna had taken me to visit him. I assumed he was still rehabilitating within the guild headquarters, though.

Then, why is it that, when I saw Ice and Queen exchange a few low, inaudible words as they passed each other down in courtyard, why did Art's words come back to me…?

Although Art had not mentioned a name when he told me, _'Come to me if he causes you any problem, Rusalka.'_

* * *

"Stop right there!" Jukuna commanded.

Eidolon took a step back from Scarling, rubbing the reddening skin on the back of his sword-wielding hand.

"Sorry," the swordsman apologized sheepishly, "she totally got me there."

The match was over in less than a minute. Scarling's lightning-quick moves had belayed the assumption that her broadsword would be too heavy to handle with only one hand.

"You succeed this stage." Jukuna's grey-green gaze passed over the assembly of the elites of the guild who were present and were required to witness. "Any objections?"

It could be said that this was the final part of the exam; a competition in face-to-face combat skills against another guild member who had the same level of abilities.

But I had already been warned that despite being the victor of the match, in every single case…

"I knew it," Charisma said with a scoff when Laude rose up.

He was in his performer's attire, his high platform boots causing him to tower above the rest of the seated elites with his already impressive height. His dark, draping green hair flowed down to his waist as he crossed one arm and inclined a bow to Jukuna.

"Allow me, my liege," Laude said harmonically, quite different from the blunt tone he had used on King the previous day.

Yes, in each case, at least one elite of the guild present to witness would rise up to challenge the victor. And every elite who could be summoned were there at Jukuna's orders.

Jukuna turned to Scarling, who did not appear to be the least affected as she stared back at Laude.

"As you are aware, since you will be up against an Elite, the requirement is not for you to win." His eyes glinted with slight amusement. "Simply show us the extent of your capabilities."

"…However, you will not pass if you do not intend to kill me," Laude added smoothly onto what Jukuna had said. With one hand he reached up and pulled his jester's hat with long, drooping tri-horns over his immaculate green hair. In his other arm he nestled a lute into position.

Lightly, the minstrel traced the fingers of one hand over the strings. He stepped away from the rest of the elites, placing himself before the swordswoman, Scarling.

"Ladies," Laude said with a prompt bow of a performer, "gentlemen, and the idiot…"

"HEY!" King protested loudly when that insult had set in.

Laude ignored that. He drew out from up his sleeve a single card, which design from the back I recognized as a tarot card. "…Allow me to show you the power of a performance."

Having announced that, he flicked the card between his fingers. It spun as it fell, gradually landing face-up on the marble tiles.

The Magician.

A nest of shadows started to emerge from the image on the tarot card's surface.

Laude strung the first note, a low 'C' which vibrated down to the base of my spine, to the center of survival, heightening the sense of awareness and threatening the sense of stability when he raised the pitch.

Scarling gripped the hilt of her broadsword tightly, holding her ground as the shadows materialized into the form of black serpents.

The second note, 'D', Laude played waveringly. It invoked the second center, the navel, the one which governed the mind's separation between reality and imagination.

The mass of aimless serpents converged, assembling into a massive dark figure in likeness of a cobra, its upper body swaying idly side to side to Laude's playing.

Third note, 'E', the center of discipline and self-control. The notes on his lute resounded and dragged on endlessly, something that shouldn't have been possible.

Scarling drew a step back, dithering.

Laude only needed to go as far as the fourth note. The heart, and centered in it were the three emotions of the heart, which the performing minstrel knew how to manipulate masterfully. Love, hatred, and…fear.

An emotion you must not allow to show in front of a serpent poised to strike.

I heard the snap of a bow at the same time I saw an arrow shoot through the dark illusion, causing it to disparate and melt away.

I had expected it to be Jukuna who had put a halt to it, but it was teal-haired Herald who was standing, his bow-arm still outstretched.

For a long while the two elites simply faced each other expectantly. For that duration of time, no one else had spoken, either. I was unable to comprehend the feeling of listlessness rippling off from the audience on the sidelines.

…

Because I…

…

"Oh, damn, seriously." Charisma was first to break the silence, sounding as if she had a shortage of air. "This happens each year they meet."

Scarling, desperately trying to regain her breath, was escorted aside by Changeling, who was possibly the only person who had not been affected.

"…Looks like you were unable to find a suitable one this year, as usual." Laude set down his lute and smiled at the hunter, whose eyes narrowed back at him.

"You trickster of a mage," Herald accused him, somehow able to ignore the fact that his own partner Changeling was a full-fledged wizard. Until then I had not knew that Herald was someone who could lose his calm.

"You two," Jukuna's authoritative voice rang out. "If you must, take it out on your own time."

* * *

"I hear those two 'were' childhood friends," Charisma's voice informed me as she came up from behind.

The taller woman met my eyes and smiled. "I have access to an extensive rumor network in Payon."

I was watching when Laude executed a back-flip in the air, to avoid Herald's row of arrows. The height and light effort of the minstrel's movements defied what should be considered normal.

"He has some mage blood in him, is that right?" I found myself asking.

Charisma let out a low chuckle. "Herald tried to convince him to follow his destiny as a mage. But, as you know, it has been hard on those with mage blood, even before the blame had been laid on them for the Wars of the Unrest ten years ago."

Herald and Laude were still ever diligent and serious in their duel, which had dragged on for the greater part of an hour by then.

"Herald never forgave Laude for losing to his fears, and turning to the circus as a means to escape his difference from others. Ironically, they met again, in this guild. And Laude had never stopped taunting Herald to show him someone who is capable of not losing out to his or her fears."

So that's what it was… It was not that Herald had anything against magic users.

"Speaking of irony," Charisma added with a half-scoff, half-laugh, "the path Laude had chosen has probably led him into more danger than he would be as a mage under the protection of Geffen."

"Why so?" I had asked.

The huntress massaged her brows with one hand as if the thought troubled her.

"There is a rumor that macabre circus, Majesta, only recruit performers who are…a bit off."


End file.
